


Bargain

by tealeyedbeing



Category: Bleach
Genre: Alternate History, Alternate Universe - Urban Fantasy, Blood and Violence, Foreign Language, Gen, Gender-Neutral Pronouns, Genderfluid Character, M/M, Out of Body Experiences, Out of Character, Possession, Post-Apocalypse, Sharing a Body
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-21
Updated: 2020-03-21
Packaged: 2021-03-01 01:14:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 21,160
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23236786
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tealeyedbeing/pseuds/tealeyedbeing
Summary: Being possessed by an entity evidently older than the entirety of human history isn't as grand as it sounds, or as traumatic.  (It's still a little traumatic.)  Ichigo's learning to deal with it, and luckily he has help.  Hereallyneeds it.
Relationships: Hollow Ichigo/Grimmjow Jaegerjaques
Comments: 26
Kudos: 47





	Bargain

**Author's Note:**

> In honor of Bleach anime coming back (!!!!) here's a wip that I was rly proud of last year. I just remembered it last night, reread it today, & then made myself sad bc it wasn't finished yet bc somehow I'd forgotten along the way that *I* wrote it so ofc it's not done yet. It's been a few months (cough eight or so) which means I've kinda lost focus on where I was going with this...  
> So, uh, help me find the ideas/motivation to continue it? Pls? Give me feedback, point out plotholes, shoots some ideas my way, I'm rly open to anything here bc a lot of this is just:  
> Ichigo: "I wish I knew what was going on."  
> Me: "Same."  
>  _help_  
>  But also enjoy! I was proud of this for a reason, & I rly do wanna finish this at some point. Give me some obligation to do so pls.  
> (I'm RLY looking forward to seeing Grimmjow & Shiro in the anime again. It's been 84 years...)

“There has to be a reason why this one didn’t wake up when all the rest did!” Ichigo exclaims, frantically trying to decipher the ancient writing and pictographs on the half rotted walls.

“You don’t know that!” Rukia pleads, hovering frantically between tearing Ichigo away from the sarcophagus in the center of the crypt they’re taking refuge in, and helping Renji keep the stone door shut.

The creatures on the other side scream and throw themselves repeatedly against the barrier, forcing her decision to race over and brace against the door as well when it groans open even behind Renji’s full weight.

“Look, here!” Ichigo excitedly wipes the dust off a section, his mind racing to put together what he hopes is salvation. “Names and- ak t’q’uilia! This one kills its own kind!”

[here lies the cannibal!]

“Ichigo, please!” Rukia begs. “Leave it! Help us keep the door shut!”

“There’s no time! There’s no other way out!” Ichigo yells back. “If I open this-”

“Then we’re killed sooner rather than later.” Renji grunts, baring his teeth in effort as claws force their way around the doorjamb. “Stop fucking around and-”

“Renji!” Rukia screams as a thinner limb slips through the gap and brutally stabs into Renji’s outermost thigh.

“I’m opening it!” Ichigo shouts, diving for the lid of the sarcophagus.

“Ichigo, d-”

The stone scrapes apart just a crack, and the world abruptly goes silent. No roaring from the monsters or screaming from his friends- just Ichigo’s own pounding heartbeat and panicked breathing. 

He looks around wildly, taking in Rukia frozen in place with her mouth hanging open from where she’d tried to reach out to him. Blood from Renji’s wound hangs in the air, suspended in time, and the monsters’ claws creeping in don’t advance an inch.

Before Ichigo can question this breach in reality any further, a guttural and raspy hiss slithers out from within the sarcophagus behind him. Ice prickles up his spine as Ichigo forces himself to turn around and face the creature he just set free.

Black, oily liquid bubbles up through the miniscule crack, spilling over the side in a sluggish stream. It creeps barely a few inches down, then defies gravity by pulling a U-turn and advancing back upwards. 

Ichigo hesitates, then reaches out to push the lid further off. His decision bears fruit, as more of the eerie substance quickly pours out, moving as nothing fluid ever could or should. It’s like nothing Ichigo has ever seen before.

Bizarrely, a voice warbles out from the goop, once it’s collectively pooled onto the lid, only a few feet in diameter. 

“ _Sashinlad vgrdznob tavs_.”

[I feel awful.]

The language is harsh, not made any easier to understand by the rough quality of the voice itself, but Ichigo’s shocked to recognize it nonetheless. This being is speaking Naigroeg, just as it’s written all over the walls. In that moment, Ichigo’s immeasurably grateful to have taken the rare language course back in university. 

“Um,” He scrambles to remember the proper structure and pronunciation for an inquiry. “Gamarjoba?” He thinks that means hello.

[Hello?]

The oily substance ripples oddly, twisting about itself like fabric more than liquid.

 _“Gamarjoba.”_ The being returns the greeting, and then shivers out a sound like a sigh. “ _Daghlili var. Modit gariq’ot.”_

[Hello.] [I’m tired. Let’s bargain.]

Ichigo winces, because he doesn’t know that last phrase, his knowledge showing its gaps. “Vts’ukhvar. Ra tkvi?”

[I’m sorry. What did you say?]

“ _Garigeba.”_ The voice reiterates tiredly, and little bubbles bloat along the sleek surface. “ _Daasakhelet tkveni p’irobebi_.”

[Bargain.] [Name your terms.]

Ichigo takes a few seconds, trying to parse out what he thinks was said from what he could translate. He thinks the being is offering some kind of deal? Ichigo wishes he had more information, but he’s desperate enough to take a devil’s contract right now regardless.

“Sheni dakhmareba mch’irdeba. Chemi megobrebi da me,” Ichigo tries, gesturing back towards Rukia and Renji pleadingly, awkward and halting in his pronunciation. “Chven unda gavidnen akedan.”

[I need your help. My friends and I,] [We need to get out of here.]

The being blows a larger bubble in its inky puddle, which pops with a disturbingly fleshy noise. “ _Gza dablok’ilia?”_

[The way is blocked?]

Ichigo nods hurriedly. “Diakh. Vints k’lavs.”

[Yes. By the ones you kill.]

“ _Me k’lavs?”_ The voice questions, then the entire pool shifts a few inches aside, as if to see around Ichigo.

[Ones I kill?]

He helpfully turns to the side, pointing at where the white claws of the deadly creatures encroach into the tomb.

“ _Usargeblo_.” The being seems to realize, but with another word Ichigo doesn’t recognize, and settles back on itself in folds. “ _Diakh, me k’lavs mat. Sul es aris?”_

[The worthless.] [Yes, I will kill them. Is that all?]

“Chemi megobrebi da me unda iq’os usaprtkho.” Ichigo hurries to add onto his terms, lest the being short him on what’s truly important- saving their lives.

[My friends and I need to be safe.]

Another bubble pops nastily. “ _Ra tkma unda. Raime skhva?”_

[Of course. Anything else?]

Ichigo’s mind races to come up with anything else. He feels terribly pressured, despite time literally forced immobile. He doesn’t want to push too far and be rejected, but neither does he want to sacrifice their own safety because he struck a deal too poorly.

“ _Medzineba_.” The voice rasps, the entire puddle pooling out listlessly, as if losing the energy to hold itself together.

[I want to sleep.]

“Sul es aris.” Ichigo blurts, immediately wincing at his own foolishness, but he has no choice.

[That is all.]

He can’t allow this being to slip out of his grasp, and have this all be for nothing. Ichigo prays that he’s said enough to ensure his friends’ safe passage, at the very least.

“ _K’argi. Me vetankhmebi tkvens p’irobebs_.” The being warbles sluggishly, and begins to coil itself back up lethargically.

[Okay. I accept your terms.]

Ichigo watches as the oily substance wraps around itself repeatedly until it almost appears as a resting snake. In the center, it hollows itself out, as if inviting something to be placed inside the gap.

“ _Modi. Mimighet_.” The watery voice commands wearily.

[Come. Accept me.]

Ichigo hesitates, only because he doesn’t know what to do. Accept them? How do they mean? Should he just- With the utmost caution, Ichigo extends his hand and places it inside the hollow of the black substance.

Instantly, the hole collapses, snapping to his skin. Ichigo gasps at the suddenness, as well as the sensation. It’s unexpectedly cold, and prickles like the spurs of insects instead of anything wet or fluid. 

Spitting out jagged strings, the being begins to haul itself up his arm. Ichigo winces as the sensation worsens, everything in him wanting to recoil from this eerie thing devouring his arm. He cranes his head away as the stuff nears his neck, trying to force down tendrils of fear that burst to life inside his chest.

“ _Shemomishvi_.” That voice comes again, reverberating and much louder now that it’s literally attached to him.

[Let me in.]

“Wh-” Ichigo thoughtlessly questions, gagging in sheer panic as the black substance lunges for his open mouth immediately.

It surges up over his entire face, forcing itself up his nose simultaneously. The taste is revolting, and Ichigo barely processes that he can’t breathe when the black pours over and _into_ his eyes. The pain is excruciating, but his screams are silent. 

In a blind frenzy, Ichigo scrabbles to free himself, but his nails are useless against the being without form, not grasping onto anything as it forces itself into his body. He can’t breathe, he’s going to suffocate, he’s going to die, he can’t breathe-!

Ichigo dimly registers the pain in his knees as he collapses to the stone floor, seeing spots of white flash in the blackness as his consciousness starts to go spotty. Why did it- it said-

All at once, his nose is clear. Ichigo instantly sucks in air, choking almost immediately after as his throat is still clogged. Almost as soon as he makes that realization, however, that obstruction clears too, and Ichigo hacks and coughs but he can _breathe_. He wheezes, holding a hand against his chest as his lungs burn and ache. 

He blinks away the spottiness in his vision, and though his eyelids stick uncomfortably, Ichigo realizes he can see again as well. 

**\** **Q’oveltvis p’anik’it./**

[Always with the panic.]

The voice returns with a dry comment, bizarrely crystal clear without any of the warbling, dissonant quality as before.

Still catching his breath and blinking away the pain, Ichigo doesn’t yet process the difference, nor why he so much more easily understands the dead language. 

“What the fuck?” He coughs, wiping his mouth but his fingers come away clean, save for his own spit. “What did you do?”

**\Ra vkna- me vkhedav./**

[What does- oh, I see.]

The being mumbles, seemingly to itself, and a considering hum feels like it buzzes on the insides of Ichigo’s eardrums- a sensation that itches as fiercely as it unnerves him.

**\Am enaze mogvianebit vists’avle. P’irveli, chveni garigeba./**

[I’ll learn this language later. First, our deal.]

“Wait, what did you-” Ichigo starts, only to jerk his head up in terror as the world snaps back into motion and sound.

“-on’t!” Rukia finishes her plaintive scream, and her lunge for Ichigo is the final straw holding back the monsters as Renji’s leg can no longer apply as much pressure.

For Ichigo, it happens both instantaneously, and in excruciating detail. 

His own body moves abruptly, as if puppeteered by another’s whims. He lunges to his feet and past Rukia in the same motion, moving so quickly it’s as if she’s still frozen in time. He watches his hand grab Renji’s shoulder and rip him away from the door, flinging the wounded man roughly behind himself. Without any obstruction, the monsters pour into the room all at once.

Ichigo sees a split second of a horrifying vision- the gaping black maw inside jagged teeth- and then he sees nothing but white. He registers the blistering heat a moment later, then the deafening roar of fire a second after that. Through it all, his eyes don’t close. His body doesn’t flinch away. It doesn’t hurt.

Ichigo is shocked silent, a passenger in his own mind and body, as the creatures are all melted away in a single, overwhelming blast. His body steps back on its own, and now it closes its eyes and rubs its knuckles over its eyelids like a child that just woke up.

 **“Daghlili var.”** His mouth says, the being’s voice layered over his own in an eerie, echoing quality. **“Medzineba.”**

[I’m tired.] [I want to sleep.]

Ichigo doesn’t know how to respond- he doesn’t know if he even can. What is happening? 

“I-Ichigo?”

Rukia’s trembling voice floats up, and his body turns to squint at his friends. Her face is bloodless, and Renji’s is just as pale. They both look terrified.

Ichigo can only watch from the backseat as his eyes flick to the wound on Renji’s leg, steadily turning his pants a bloody red. He suddenly feels a strange pressure, like someone is pressing fingers into the back of his brain, rooting around for something.

 **“Friend. Hurt.”** His voice says thickly, the words sharp and stunted, as if his native tongue has suddenly become foreign. 

Renji flinches away as Ichigo’s body kneels next to him. “Don’t tou-”

His body ignores the half formed warning, seizing Renji’s leg in a harsh grip. Renji yelps, trying to pry its hand off his wound, but Ichigo’s arm doesn’t budge at all. Red light bleeds out from between its fingers, and Renji screams.

“Ichigo, stop! Please stop!” Rukia shouts, throwing herself at Ichigo’s body to try and force it away from hurting their friend, but it’s unmoved.

Ichigo wishes he could, but his body doesn’t respond. There’s not even a fight. There’s just nothing there, nothing to grasp onto. His every attempt just evaporates. He’s formless, not even possessing the fingers to clutch at air. 

As suddenly as it’d grabbed onto Renji, it lets go and sits back on its heels, entirely unaffected by Rukia’s frantic efforts.

 **“There. Better.”** It declares, and rubs at its eyes again with an enormous yawn. **“Tired. Sleep?”**

“What the fuck is wrong with you?!” Renji shrieks, holding onto his leg with both hands. “That fucking hurt! Get away from me, you-”

“Renji…” Rukia abruptly reaches out, her voice stunned and breathless. “Your leg.”

Renji’s aggressive swearing peters out as he looks down, and his face goes slack. He draws his hands away slowly, in sheer disbelief, and Ichigo can see unmarred skin through the hole in his jeans.

Renji looks back up, gawking at Ichigo’s face. “Ichigo?”

 **“Hn.”** His body grunts in reply, and rolls off its heels to sit down on one hip. **“Sleep.”**

Without warning, the lack of control is no longer a problem. Ichigo experiences a crazy moment of unfounded vertigo, and flails as he catches himself unnecessarily. He’s left staring back at his friends with wide eyes, as dumbfounded as them.

**\Wake if danger. I sleep./**

The voice mumbles inside his skull, and Ichigo boggles as it feels like a part of his brain just goes numb- shut off and evidently, asleep.

With excruciating care, Ichigo lifts his hands and looks at them. His fingers tremble violently, but respond and curl as if they were never anything else but his own hands. He looks back at his friends. His mouth is dry, and swallowing only makes him feel worse, viscerally remembering the slick-prickly sensation of suffocating.

Ichigo violently twists away and vomits.

“Ichigo!” Rukia scrambles to catch him, holding him tight across the chest as he spits up mostly bile. “You’re okay! I’ve got you!”

Ichigo heaves again. He might be sobbing at the same time. 

“I’ve got you, you’re okay.” Rukia’s still murmuring, sweeping his hair back off his clammy forehead and hugging him from behind. “Everything’s okay, we’re okay.”

“What the fuck just happened…” Renji questions dumbly, not sounding all there.

Ichigo shakes his head, trying to come up with an answer even as Rukia hisses at Renji to leave it alone.

“I- I made a deal…”

“What?” Renji asks, flabbergasted.

Ichigo raises his head, looking straight at the other man, and repeats himself with more awareness. “I made a deal.”

Renji gawks for a moment longer, than lurches up onto his knees and reaches for Ichigo. His broad hand claps Ichigo on the shoulder, and the way he hadn’t hesitated to do so strikes Ichigo suddenly as profoundly comforting. 

“What the fuck? With who? When?”

“I don’t- it was so weird,” Ichigo starts and stops, sitting back on his ass when Rukia pulls him away from his own spit up mess and kneels next to him, still hugging him protectively tight to her chest. “I opened the sarcophagus and time just stopped? Everything was frozen.”

Renji’s elaborate brows contort in consternation, but he doesn’t voice any disbelief, not after what he’d just seen.

Ichigo tiredly allows himself to rest against Rukia, taking comfort from her gentle petting of his hair. “This… stuff, climbed out. It was black, shiny- didn’t move like any normal liquid. It spoke to me.”

Renji breaks his gaze away, glancing over Ichigo’s head briefly at Rukia. Whatever look they share, neither of them interrupt as Ichigo recalls as much as he can.

“It spoke Naigroeg,” Ichigo continues, his own eyes unfocused. “It wanted to make a deal, told me to name my terms. I said we needed to get out, that we needed to be safe. It agreed, and then it-”

Ichigo helplessly gags again, covering his mouth.

“Ichigo?” Rukia worriedly checks on him, craning down to see his face. “Don’t push yourself, take your time.”

Ichigo shakes his head again, forcing himself to swallow down the nausea of the memory. He needs to get through this. He owes his friends an explanation for his actions, even those he couldn’t control. He takes a deep breath, then forces it out in a harsh whisper.

“It climbed inside of me.”

Rukia can’t hide the way she gasps, and Renji’s face twitches with horrified disgust.

“It was in my mouth, my nose- it even went in my eyes.” Ichigo admits all in a rush, feeling sick as he remembers how much it hurt. “I couldn’t breathe, it hurt so much, I thought I was going to die.”

Renji’s hand squeezes on his shoulder, unwavering support that Ichigo draws strength from, equal to the comfort he pulls from Rukia’s embrace.

“But suddenly it cleared, and I could hear it- hear it in my _head_.” Ichigo realizes at the same time as he recalls. “It was- it _is_ inside of me. I- I don’t remember what it said. I couldn’t move- I couldn’t do anything. Time started moving again and it took control. It killed all those monsters. That was part of our deal.”

Ichigo looks up frantically, laying a hand on Renji’s leg. “And then it healed you! It kept us safe! It kept our deal!”

“And then it- what? Just went away?” Renji asks, dubious to counterpoint Ichigo’s burgeoning elation that they survived.

“No, it’s-” Ichigo draws his hand back, hovering it over the side of his head that feels strangely numb and faraway. “It’s asleep? I think? It kept repeating that it was tired, that it wanted to sleep.”

“Yeah, it did.” Renji nods, his brows lifting from their intense furrow somewhat. 

Ichigo twists, hugging Rukia properly. “You guys, we’re _alive!_ It worked!”

“Yeah, and now you’re fucking possessed or some shit.” Renji mutters, but even he can’t repress a growing grin. “But you’re right. We fucking lived.”

Ichigo whoops, maybe a bit hysterical, and Renji laughs as he throws himself onto Rukia’s other side so that they’re all smashed together. 

“Ugh, you’re crushing me.” Rukia complains, muffled between their chests, but she makes no move to elbow her way free.

She doesn’t complain either as Ichigo buries his face in her hair, doubtlessly smearing a mess there. He’s just so thankful that they’re all alive. Whatever happened, this made it worth that. 

Rukia allows the embrace to linger for a few moments longer, _then_ proceeds to wiggle her way free. “Okay, c’mon. We need to go. Who knows how much longer it’ll be safe here.”

“Right.” Renji agrees, pulling away and standing with a cautious bounce on his previously injured leg. 

“Here,” Rukia half offers, half pulls Ichigo to his feet.

Never has standing under his own power felt so unbelievably freeing. 

* * *

Ichigo wakes with a jerk, feeling profoundly uncomfortable. It's like his brain has become too swollen for his skull. He feels bruised and raw, like someone stuck his grey matter in a blender but didn't run it until the mixture was smooth before they poured chunks out into a bowl. It hurts, not sharply, but persistently.

He can't help but curl up, cradling his head in an instinctual bid to alleviate the pain. Why does-

**\This language is asinine. Why do you need so many words for the same thing?/**

Ichigo stiffens as the voice complains, now in near fluent Japanese, and his memories of the day before come flooding back.

Being ambushed by the creatures, taking refuge in the crypt, opening the sarcophagus, making a deal with the inky pool, being possessed then saved by it, and then beginning the slow trek back to their home.

Ichigo had gone to sleep gratefully as Renji took first watch, and as he sits up and looks around now, the man is resting next to him. Rukia must've taken the second shift.

He winces at a stab in his temple, intangible fingers rifling through his abused head, letting him know why he feels like shit. The being must've woken up before him and gone poking around, and evidently learned Japanese in that time.

Ichigo debates on waking Renji, or going to find Rukia, but the voice pipes up again before he can come to a decision.

 **\What's wrong with leaving things the way they were?/** It mutters irritably, annoyed by whatever it's found. **\Khe aris khe. Why does anyone need to know what kind it is? How does that help?/**

[A tree is a tree.]

Ichigo blinks at nothing, bewildered as the voice continues to rant about all the different kinds of trees.

 **\Birch, oak, ceder- why does it matter? It's all just wood! Call it what it is and be done with it! Humans,/** It scoffs in apparent derision. \ **Always needlessly complicating everything./**

"Um." Ichigo unintentionally says aloud, and becoming distinctly aware of when the being in his head zeroes in on him specifically, his awareness of them.

He imagines that being under a microscope would feel similar.

**\Oh good, you're finally awake. I have questions that you don't have memories for./**

"I- okay?" Ichigo flusters, taken by surprise.

 **\I've realized you didn't know what you were agreeing to. Why is that?/** It demands immediately, straight off the bat. \ **You don't know me, yet you woke me and know my language. How is this possible?/**

What?

"Well for starters, I didn't know because you didn't tell me." Ichigo says, a bit bitterly because he's not going to be getting over those memories any time soon. "Thanks for that, by the way."

 **\I assumed you knew, but fine. I apologize./** The voice grumbles, surprising Ichigo with the ease in which they offered it at all.

"Oh. Um, thank you." Ichigo awkwardly accepts the apology.

**\You're welcome. Now answer my question./**

Bossy. What was it again? How he doesn't know them? Ichigo thinks about it, but he draws a total blank. It's a paradox. How doesn't he know about something he doesn't know?

"I have no clue." He admits, curiosity growing rapidly though. "Why did you assume that I knew what I was doing?"

 **\You woke me up./** They repeat, like that's the important bit, apparently with the implication that not everyone could.

"Yes," Ichigo agrees, cautiously slow. "Why does that matter?"

The voice doesn't immediately answer, seemingly in their own thoughts and thankfully leaving Ichigo's untouched.

Ichigo takes the moment to sit more comfortably, crossing his legs underneath himself. 

**\I don't understand./** They finally admit, and they sound very displeased about it. \ **You shouldn't have been able to wake me if you weren't prepared to become my host./**

Ichigo's stomach gives an uneasy twist.

"Host?"

 **\You don't know anything about** **me.** **/** The being says, utterly confused. **\How can you know my language and not know me?/**

"What do you mean by host?" Ichigo pressures.

He waits, but the voice does not answer. In fact, their presence seems to drift, not quite going numb but definitely no longer at the forefront of Ichigo's consciousness.

"Hello?" Ichigo tries to call them back, but he doesn't know if they can hear him.

Just as they'd said, Ichigo doesn't know anything about how any of this works. He can't do anything but wait for them to speak to him again.

Disappointed and unsettled, Ichigo lays back down. He cushions his head on a bent arm and closes his eyes. He won't be getting any more sleep, he doesn't think, but he still needs the rest.

* * *

The voice doesn't return. Ichigo can tell they're still awake at least, and occasionally they'll deep dive in a memory pool, but otherwise they make no attempt to communicate again.

He told his friends about the new conversation, but it initially didn't go anywhere either. At the very least, they now have more evidence that Ichigo's new body roommate isn't outright malicious. If anything, they're as equally confused about what's going on, which is oddly comforting.

Mostly, Ichigo's just extremely grateful that his body is still largely his own. He has no doubt that the being could take him over again without any effort, and there'd be nothing Ichigo could do to stop them, but that hasn't happened (yet). He has some concerns about being a host, but Ichigo would rather be clueless under his own power than be a helpless passenger forever trapped in the backseat.

"Well, it's clearly different than the rest." Rukia adds to their theory crafting, since there's nothing else to do but talk about the topic as they mindlessly trudge along. 

"I've never heard of any creature like you described. I've definitely never heard any of them speak before."

"What if they all start out that way though?" Renji wonders, rather grimly at that. "Goop, then possess a host, and they slowly turn into the monsters they are today?"

"Gee, thanks, asshole." Ichigo mutters, and Renji does grimace apologetically.

"No, I don't think so." Rukia, at least, shoots down that theory pretty quick. "Remember how quickly they all appeared after the first tomb was uncovered? They were already fully formed, and Ichigo doesn't look any different."

"Yeah, 'cept for his eyes."

"My eyes?" Ichigo questions. "What's wrong with my eyes?"

"Nothing now," Renji assures. "But they were black before. Yanno, when the other one was driving."

"Oh." Ichigo frowns thoughtfully.

"So it's unique." Rukia reiterates. "Ichigo is a host, and you said that- in the crypt- that it kills its own kind?"

Ichigo pinches his brows together, trying to recall everything that he read. He was frantic at the time, some of what he learned now forgotten, but he remembers the things that gave him the confidence to push the lid off.

"Yeah, it said, _ak t’q’uilia_ , which means 'here lies the cannibal', and it had a list of names that weren't human, far as I could guess. I mean, obviously _it's_ not human, so the only thing it could cannibalize is its own kind."

"Great…" Renji groans a bit. "That really doesn't make me feel all that better, knowing you're toting around a cannibal in your skull."

Ichigo sighs. "Thank you, Renji."

"Do you remember anything else?" Rukia inquires.

Ichigo chews on a thumbnail as he recollects. "I think… there was this one word, _tetri_ , that was repeated a lot. It means white. It was a noun though. Maybe a name?"

"You're telling me that the cannibal in your head is named Shiro?" Renji throws a smirk over in Ichigo's direction. "Cute."

"I didn't say that," Ichigo denies, but he can't exactly disprove it.

"Well next time, why don't you ask?" Rukia suggests. "A name might go a long way to helping us understand it- them."

"Speaking of, does it really- sorry, _they_." Renji hastily corrects himself as Rukia shoots him a pointed look. "Do they really not hear us right now?"

Ichigo obligingly waits a few seconds, waiting for any acknowledgement or recognition that the being is aware that they're being talked about. The feeling in his head doesn't change at all, no invisible eyes or fingers in his brain, and no voice saying anything.

"Nope, not that I can tell."

"How _can_ you tell?" Renji leans in a step, like proximity matters when it comes to the inside of Ichigo's skull.

"It's just this feeling." Ichigo tries to describe. "Like- yanno how you can tell when someone's staring at you? It's kinda like that, but a lot more… present."

"How does it feel right now?"

"Like they're far away. It's like a tv on mute. I can still see the light on, tell that something’s happening, but I don't know what and there's no sound."

"Huh. Crazy." Renji comments, and Ichigo nods along.

"Anyway, you said they were hung up on the fact that you woke them up?" Rukia pushes the conversation along. "And knew their language?"

"Yeah, it was weird." Ichigo confirms. "They assumed I knew them, and that's why I woke them up- to be a host, whatever that means. I know Naigroeg, yeah, but so do a bunch of people. I don't see why that's a big deal."

Rukia hums in thought, and Renji seems pretty content to let this part pass pretty unaddressed. This whole thing collectively goes over all their heads, but especially this bit.

In the middle of musing on the dilemma again, the mental metaphor of the television switches off.

"Oh, they just fell asleep." Ichigo comments aloud, elaborating as Renji shoots him a curious glance. "It feels like a part of my brain just goes numb. It doesn't hurt or anything, but it's definitely weird."

"Maybe they're still tired?" Rukia guesses.

"Tired from what though?" Renji asks. "Far as we know, they were in a coffin for who knows how long. What, were they awake that whole time?"

Ichigo feels a wave of sympathetic claustrophobia at just the idea. "God, I hope not."

"Coma patients sleep a lot during their recovery until they regain healthier amounts of energy." Rukia suggests. "Perhaps it's something similar?"

"Or… maybe they need a host." Renji starts. "You didn't happen to look inside that coffin, did you?"

Ichigo shakes his head, not particularly liking where Renji is taking this idea.

"Hear me out," Renji spreads his hands out, supplying the rather grotesque picture. "That was a human sized coffin. Shiro needs a host. Host dies, and Shiro gets locked away with it. Hell, maybe they were buried alive together. Anyway, host dies, which obviously isn't good for Shiro."

"Don't name them Shiro, they're not a stray cat."

Renji waves off Ichigo's protest impatiently. "So Shiro's stuck in there without a living host. Even if they sleep the entire time, something's gotta give. Coma patient recovery plus stranded parasite equals a lot of sleeping, even with a new host."

"Don't call them a parasite, we don't know that." Rukia scolds him fiercely. "They could be mutualistic, or commensalistic for all we know."

Renji looks like he might disagree, then catches a look at Ichigo's face and hastily agrees with her. "Yeah, you're right, sorry."

Ichigo's sour look doesn't really lighten up. "You're an awful friend. I regret saving your life."

"Hey, I said I was sorry!"

"Yeah? You're-"

A distant scream has them all throwing themselves towards the nearest cover, bickering forgotten.

Ichigo's heart starts to race. Shiro would- dammit, Renji- the being _would_ have just fallen asleep, and they encounter a monster soon after. The being had said before for Ichigo to wake them if there was danger, but he still doesn't know how to do that.

He really doubts that just speaking aloud will do it, and that's just not feasible with those creatures on the hunt. Ichigo would be found out in a heartbeat if he makes any noise.

Maybe if they're careful, they can sneak by the monster without being caught. Unfortunately, they've been caught out pretty far in a relatively open area. A corpse of trees isn't going to provide much shelter against one of those things.

Huddled together around the broadest trunk, waiting to lay eyes on where the creature is coming from, Ichigo briefly squeezes his eyes shut and tries to contact the sleeping being in his head.

_We're in danger. We need help. Help us. I need you._

He tries to think it as clearly and as strongly as possible. The numb presence is entirely unaffected.

"Anything?" Renji whispers.

Ichigo snaps his eyes open, frustrated. "No. Fuck, I don't know how to do this!"

"Shh!" Rukia hisses, waving frantically and they all try to flatten themselves closer to the ground.

Ichigo twists onto his belly, crawling forwards to try and see through the undergrowth better. He can hear the damn thing, and it sounds like a big one.

God, he hopes the being will wake up if Ichigo's life is seriously in danger, otherwise they're screwed and what would be the point of becoming a host at all?

The creature finally stomps into view. This one resembles a massive, armored boar, and Ichigo's heart drops. There's no way they'll be able to confront such a beast. Running would only be asking for tucks in the back, or to be crushed underfoot.

Ichigo ducks as beady black eyes cast out between the trees, and the creature snorts as it heavily scents the air.

Fuck, Ichigo mentally panics. They're not upwind of it.

The boar-beast grunts as it steadily ambles closer, following the bare wisps of smell that tell it that living people are nearby.

Ichigo blindly reaches to his sides, grabbing a handful of each of his friends. He's prepared to shield them with his own body if need be. Maybe a few broken bones will be enough to wake Shiro- fuck that's not their-

 _Wait_ , Ichigo's eyes widen.

Maybe it's not their name, but it _has_ to be important. It wouldn't have been repeated so much in the crypt if it weren't. The being had made such a big deal about the language too!

God, he's an idiot.

 _Tetri! Tetri, dakhmareba mch’irdeba!_

[White! White, I need help!]

He thinks it as hard as he can, blocking everything else out, pouring his heart into the call like he would a prayer.

_Tetri, dakhmareba mch’irdeba! Tetri!_

[White, I need help! White!]

In the back of his head, someone stirs.

"Ichigo!" Renji bellows, shattering Ichigo's concentration as the he rips Ichigo off the ground.

The boar has charged, shattering trees like toothpicks along the way. It's closing on them too quickly, and Ichigo's not even on his feet yet-

Until he is, once more tossing Renji aside like the larger man is weightless. His hand snaps out, wrapping around a tusk meant to gore him, and with a single shift of his weight, he flings the massive creature nearly forty meters through the air.

 **"Usargeblo."** Ichigo's voice snarls, echoing with dual tones as the other wears his skin. **"Medzina."**

[Worthless] [I was sleeping.]

Oh thank God. If Ichigo could feel his knees right now, they'd be weak with relief.

Shiro- fuck it, might as well- squares their body to the boar, which screams as it rights itself with thunderous crashing.

 **"Modi!"** They scream right back, taunting the irate beast with mock beckoning motions.

[Come on!]

Inexplicably, however, the other creature freezes as soon as it properly lays eyes on Shiro. Then, without any further hesitation and much to Ichigo's shock, the beast turns tail and flees wildly for its life.

Shiro scoffs, loosening their posture. **"Sust’i."**

[Weakling.]

Ichigo thinks that'll hopefully be the end of that encounter, but Shiro settles into a new stance, still facing the fleeing boar. With one hand extended, predicting the beast's progress, Shiro reels back with their other arm.

Ichigo has barely felt the heat in his palm when Shiro hurls a bolt of white fire into the air. It both cracks and travels like lightning, and far ahead, the boar's upper body utterly explodes in a disgusting shower of blood, meat, and bone- dead long before it hits the ground.

Shiro nonchalantly dusts their hands off. **"Da es asea."**

[And that's that.]

Ichigo is stunned, and he's not the only one. As Shiro turns back around, he sees that Rukia and Renji too are staring after what's left of the creature that could've killed them, yet had been killed itself so effortlessly. Their wide eyes snap to Shiro attentively as the being walks Ichigo's body back over.

 **"You don't know my language."** Shiro states flatly, not a question since they already know the answer. **"Learn it. Japanese is tedious."**

Rukia snaps out of her shock first, and quickly executes a very deep bow of respect. "Thank you!"

Renji startles a bit, and then does the same. "Thank you. As well as before." He murmurs, holding the bow a little longer as he mentions the last time they met.

Shiro hums a non answer, and abruptly Ichigo's staggering in place, once more thrown off by a sense of unfounded vertigo.

**\Your friends aren't bad. I'm tired. I'm going back to sleep./**

"Thank you!" Ichigo blurts as well, receiving the mental equivalent of a grunt before Shiro goes numb, just like that.

"Holy shit." Renji straightens up, fingers twisted in his hair. He looks like he's still in shock. "Holy fucking shit!"

Rukia places a hand over her heart, and takes a few calming breaths of her own.

Ichigo goes for broke and sits down hard. 

Well, at least now he knows how to wake Shiro up.

* * *

“Naigroeg, at its basics, relies on common ground,” Ichigo explains, using a stick to draw the alphabet into the dirt so his friends can see. “A lot of linguists thought it’s too primitive in its simplicity, but honestly, it’s just about efficiency.”

They’ve settled into an old, dilapidated house for the night and at his friends’ insistence (as well as Shiro’s, he supposes), Ichigo has begun to teach them what he remembers from his college course so long ago. He remembers more than he thought, and wonders if Shiro has anything to do with that.

“A tree is a tree.” Ichigo says, smirking a bit as he uses Shiro’s tirade from before as an example. “Doesn’t matter if it’s pine, birch, oak, whatever. If it grows tall, has bark, all that; it’s a tree. _Khe._ ”

Rukia looks like she wishes she could take notes, and Renji rubs his chin as he listens.

“The Naigroeg alphabet has forty characters.” Ichigo taps his stick along the four rows of ten he’s carefully written. “They’re more like hieroglyphs than letters or kanji. Seven of them have no direct translation, and require context to make sense.”

“Which ones?” Rukia asks, and pays close attention to when Ichigo points out the characters he means.

“Why isn’t it translated?”

“Well, the initial theory from what I can remember is just that there’s fewer characters than what we have.” Ichigo responds, absently peeling bark off his pointer stick. “So these seven share multiple meanings. My professor had her own theory. Wrote a thesis about how _all_ the characters have more than one meaning, because the entire language is so broad, right? Efficiency. One word for all the different kinds of trees. One character for all the different combinations it can make in a word.”

Renji scrubs a palm over his forehead. “Sounds fucking confusing.”

“It can be in writing,” Ichigo allows, because God knows he’d struggled with it, but part of the fun of learning it was the challenge. 

“Naigroeg is much simpler while speaking and listening though. It may sound rough, but it gets the point across in as little wasted effort as possible. It’s why it sounds so simple in direct translation. It loses a lot of nuance in the process.”

“So how would you spell tree?” Rukia prompts, keeping along the example Ichigo provided.

Ichigo obligingly writes the word in the dirt, off to the side of the alphabet. 

Rukia squints at it, trying to decipher the characters Ichigo used. Admittedly, teaching them in the dark with only the moon for lighting isn’t great for the eyes, but they need to save the daylight for traveling. 

“This one and…” She points first at one character in the chart, double checking her process multiple times before she settles on her second choice. “That one.”

“You got it.” Ichigo confirms.

“Yes, but _why_ these characters, and not others?” Rukia questions. 

“Because Naigroeg is more sound and imagery than just a letter,” Ichigo reminds her. 

“ _Kh_ is just that: a sound. It’s sharp, like the snap of a branch. _E_ , in this case, is hard as well and drawn out, like the bark and length of a tree. The words fit the form of what’s being described.”

“Oh,” Renji suddenly snaps his fingers repeatedly, trying to remember something. “What’s that word, on- onomah- something. Words for sounds.”

“Onomatopoeia! Exactly!” Ichigo enthusiastically agrees. “It’s kind of like that, yeah!”

“So… a word for something short would be as well?” Rukia hazards a dubious guess.

“Generally speaking, yeah it would.” Ichigo agrees. “But it depends on the context. A thing can be short but wide, or it can be short and long. The first half of the word would be short, but the other half would cover whatever else the thing happens to be.” 

“Take the first person pronoun, for example,” Ichigo elaborates, writing it in the dirt next to the word for tree. “Alone, ’I’ would be ‘ _me_ ’, similar to English. But if you use it in future tense, ‘I will’ becomes _‘viknebi’_ because then you’re including the potential of what you will be, not just who you currently are.”

“The you of today is not the you of tomorrow.” Rukia murmurs. “I think I read that in a poem at one point.”

“It’s still confusing as fuck,” Renji complains. “But I think I’m starting to get the thing about efficiency. It’s everything at once, not drawn out.”

“ _Yes_ ,” Ichigo excitedly points the stick at Renji. “Exactly.”

Renji sits back, rubbing his eyes vigorously. “I think that’s enough for one night. My brain feels fucking weird.”

Rukia nods, though she’s more reluctant. “I agree, we need to rest. We can cover more of this at another time.”

“I’ll take first watch.” Ichigo offers. “I’m all awake and kinda worked up to be thinking about Naigroeg again.”

Rukia smiles indulgently at Ichigo’s rare academic side making a reappearance. It’s been quite a long time since any of them could look back on their lives prior to the cataclysmic disaster with anything more than regret and longing. 

“Okay, just remember you’re on watch. Pay attention.”

“Yeah, I got it _mom.”_ Ichigo teases, and makes a demonstration of wiping out all that he wrote. “Get some rest.”

Renji rolls over right in his spot, spreading out with a sigh as he gets comfortable on the thin blankets that managed to survive the test and wear of time and exposure. Rukia settles in on his other side, close enough to touch, but not quite.

Ichigo knee walks over to the wall and leans against it, positioning himself so that he can see out the broken window just by lifting his chin a bit, as well as face the only door into this room. 

Mostly, night watch consists of listening over line of sight. After all, the monsters out there have no reason to hide or conceal themselves. One can always hear them coming. 

Keeping Rukia’s warning in mind, Ichigo nonetheless ponders about the structure and use of Naigroeg. Particularly, he thinks about the word or name that was etched repeatedly into the crypt’s walls, what Shiro responded to, and earned them that nickname.

Tetri.

Ichigo frowns as he tries to remember how exactly it’d been recorded, which characters the word had used to become a noun. He scrawls a few possibilities in the dirt, trying to see if any of it strikes him as familiar. 

The meaning was clear, deceptively simple: White. Why white? The being that’d crept out of the sarcophagus had been the opposite, a pitch black that devoured all light. Shiro _does_ use an energy that resembles white fire, however. Does that lend itself to the reason behind the word? Obviously there’s a meaning there that’s far more than just color.

Literally, Ichigo muses, the color white contains the entire spectrum of all possible colors. Historically, most often in literature but also in psychology, white is seen akin to perfection: completion and purity. 

It would be, Ichigo realizes, the height of Naigroeg. Everything at once. Is that why Shiro had been so surprised that Ichigo knew Naigroeg, but not them? That idea, of course, relies upon Tetri being Shiro’s actual name, a theory that’s yet to be proven either way. 

Ichigo chews on his bottom lip, tapping the stick against his chin as he considers the list before him. There’s only so many combinations he can make, and he can tell that a few come close, but none particularly strike him as right. He’s missing something. 

What if it’s not a name, but a title? The word would still sound the same, but it would be recorded differently. ‘A’ would be too general, even for Naigroeg, so what about ‘the’…

Ichigo writes it out carefully, and sits back to observe it in full. That’s it. That’s the word that repeated itself so often on the crypt’s walls. 

Tetri: The White. 

Now the question becomes what the title (again, if that’s what it actually is) is for. The White of what? It can’t just be The White, could it? How would that make sense? One can’t just call someone The Duke, without inherently asking who and where over what. 

Typically, titles are given to figures of authority, either religious or bureaucratic. Naigroeg is an ancient language, preceding even Old Latin itself by a few centuries. At some point in time, was Shiro seen as a leader? A being of such influence that they were accredited with such an encompassing title? 

Ichigo jerks out of his thoughts at a scraping sound, but is relieved to find that it’s just Renji shifting in his sleep. The noise is timely though, proving Rukia’s warning just. Ichigo became too distracted, even if he did react quickly. He needs to pay more attention, especially when his musings really aren’t getting anywhere.

Considering the rediscovered word once more, committing it to memory, Ichigo then wipes it all out. 

* * *

Ichigo wakes already walking, in the middle of a conversation.

 **“If you are more than happy, you’re still bednieri,”** Shiro is saying. **“You are _bednieri._ Your body speaks the difference.”**

[happy]

“So bednieri is a smile, but _bednieri_ would be leaping for joy?” Rukia provides an example, ruminating on the emphasis Shiro put on the same word.

Her calm response seems to indicate that this conversation has been happening for some time now. She’s not surprised to be communicating with Shiro, nor does Renji seem alarmed. Ichigo wonders how long he’s been asleep.

 **“In essence.”** Shiro agrees. **“Why change the word if only the emotion gains strength?”**

“Good point.” Rukia murmurs thoughtfully, clearly rethinking everything she’s ever learned about synonyms. 

**“Ichigo is awake.”** Shiro speaks plainly, startling all three of them with the sudden pronouncement. **“A moment.”**

Ichigo has barely processed that his consciousness has been acknowledged, when Shiro is speaking again. This time, however, he doesn’t feel his mouth move.

 **\I woke before sunrise, and didn’t see a reason to wake you if I can walk just the same./** They say, and Ichigo notices that their voice does not seem to echo inside his head. **\I’ve since been entertaining your friends’ questions./**

It doesn’t sound like Shiro is bothered by such a thing, and Ichigo wonders if _he_ should be upset at how casually the being took over. 

Both prior times of Shiro’s control had been in times of duress, and were over quickly. Now, with no threat and his friends perfectly calm, Ichigo finds it difficult to feel panicked by the loss of autonomy. The fact that his body isn’t thrumming with adrenaline also plays a factor. Is it even panic if his chest isn’t buzzing and tight?

 **\You may have it back if you like./** Shiro says, evidently privy to Ichigo’s thoughts. **\Chven ertni vart. Chven ar vart shansebi./**

[We are one.] [We aren’t at odds.]

No, Ichigo decides, he is not upset nor afraid. He has no reason to be.

 **“Ichigo is comfortable,”** Shiro announces to his friends. **“But would you like to speak with him? I can make it so we share a tongue.”**

They can?

**\Of course. You’re not my prisoner./**

“Oh.” Ichigo says, startled when it comes out of his mouth as a legitimate noise. “Oh! Whoa, this is weird.”

 **“Of course we must take turns,”** Shiro uses his mouth right afterwards. **“Otherwise it’s uazroba.”**

[nonsense.]

“That’s trippy as fuck.” Renji notes, but he looks thrilled, in an amused sort of way. 

“Uaz- sorry, what’s that word?” Rukia inquires, all in on this learning the language.

 **“Uazroba,”** Shiro patiently repeats for her. **“Nonsense.”**

“Uaz-roba.” Rukia carefully pronounces, murmuring the word under her breath to grow more confident with it. 

Ichigo tries to take a peek at the sky, but Shiro isn’t looking up- oh, now they are. The sun hasn’t reached its peak yet, so it’s before noon. Still, it’s been hours since sunrise. No wonder his friends weren’t surprised, but he wonders how much they’d been before.

 **\Very./** Shiro supplies dryly. **\But they calmed once they realized I’m no threat to them. It’s our bargain./**

“Wait, you’re still adhering to that?” Ichigo questions, realizing belatedly that speaking aloud in response to Shiro’s mental statement must sound like total nonsequitur to his friends. 

**\I hear your thoughts just fine, Ichigo, and of course I am./** Shiro answers, like they’re faintly offended by the implication that they wouldn’t keep the deal going. 

“Adhering to what now?” Renji wonders.

“Oh, it’s- no, it’s just-” Ichigo starts and stops, slightly frazzled at trying to respond to two different directions at once. 

**“Our bargain.”** Shiro takes over, speaking aloud for both Ichigo and Renji’s benefit. **“In exchange for Ichigo’s q’opna, I will safeguard his friends. It doesn’t expire.”**

[being]

“Oh.” Ichigo acknowledges, feeling a little bit foolish. 

Ichigo can’t exactly _stop_ his body from carrying Shiro, so as long as the two of them are together, the deal obviously remains. 

“His… q’opna?” Rukia carefully repeats in question.

 **“Ichigo’s being,”** Shiro translates for her, but curling their lip back as if the definition is restrictive. **“It’s more than just his body I share. His past and future are both mine as well, just as mine are his, if he cares to look.”**

“I can do that?” Ichigo asks, immediately intrigued by the idea of learning about Shiro straight from the source.

Shiro sighs, as if weary. **“Of course. I still don’t know how you don’t already know this.”**

“To be fair,” Rukia tries. “I don’t think anyone discovered your resting place before the world collapsed.”

Shiro pinches their brows together in consternation. **“Why would where I was buried matter to who I am?”**

“Oh, um,” Rukia flusters, not exactly having a clear cut answer to that.

Ichigo can feel his face go slack, Shiro obviously very unimpressed.

**\Ichigo, walk. I’m tired./**

Ichigo’s barely gotten the warning before he nearly falls on his face. He yelps, catching himself before he eats dirt. He can feel Shiro already distancing themself, and scrambles for one last question before they’re out of reach.

“Wait, what’s your name?”

 **\What you’ve been calling me is fine./** Shiro dismisses, but also endorses the simple nickname. **\Daghlili var. Mogvianebit davilap’arak’ebt./**

[I’m tired. We’ll talk later.]

Without waiting for a response, they go mute.

Ichigo huffs a little, straightening himself out.

“Ichigo?” Rukia leans in. 

“Shiro left.” He explains shortly. “Said they were tired again and just fucked off. I think they’re frustrated, but shit, I am too, yanno? How am I supposed to know about any of this if they won’t tell me?”

Rukia pats his arm sympathetically. 

“Ah, whatever.” Ichigo waves it off, resuming the long walk and catching up to where Renji stopped to wait for them. “What were you guys talking about while I was asleep?”

“You mean after the heart attack he gave me when he sat bolt upright when I thought you were dead asleep this morning?” Renji snorts. “Nothing much. Just a lot of translation lessons mainly.”

“Wait, he? Did Shiro say that?” Ichigo questions.

“Well, no, but you’re a guy, and he sounds like one, so…” Renji awkwardly explains, caving quickly under Rukia’s deadpan stare. “Okay, fine. They. Sorry.”

Rukia rolls her eyes, muttering about men under her breath.

“So nothing new on that front, huh?” Ichigo muses, crossing his fingers together on the top of his head. “Least they told me that Shiro’s fine to call ‘em by.”

“They said that to us too, this morning.” Rukia agrees. “And you’re right. We didn’t really touch on a gender, all assumptions aside.”

“Jesus, woman, I said I was sorry!”

Ichigo inhales deeply, then lets it out in a gust. “Anything else?”

“They mentioned the bargain a bit,” Rukia adds. “Not that we realized it at the time. Just that they wouldn’t hurt us, as you’d asked.”

Ichigo hums a note of acknowledgement. 

“Oh, they ain’t a fan of canned beans.” Renji recalls with a snicker. “Ate ‘em cuz they said you needed ‘em, but definitely didn’t enjoy it.”

Ichigo curls his lips up in amusement. He can almost picture it, from the little idea of what he’s gathered about Shiro’s personality. At least that explains why he isn’t starving. The ache in his stomach is no more pronounced than normal.

“I asked them about the other creatures, and Shiro called them the worthless? Us-argeblo?” Rukia says, stuttering briefly on the Naigroeg word. “They didn’t explain further and I was a little afraid to ask again.”

“Yeah, no fucking clue what’s that supposed to mean.” Renji mutters, kicking a stone and watching it skip and skitter off the way. “Guess it ain’t a lie though. Fuckers definitely aren’t worth a damn to me.”

“After that?” Rukia pauses to ponder on the morning past, then shrugs. “Yeah, it was pretty much Naigroeg lessons after that. I learned a lot.”

“Gahq’evit.” Renji states proudly, and Ichigo barks a laugh.

[Fuck you.]

Of course Renji would ask to learn a swear. God, what a tool.

Ichigo’s grin persists for a while afterwards.

* * *

Ichigo’s… he’s not sure. He thinks he may be dreaming? It’s difficult to tell. He doesn’t feel right. Nothing does- and that’s just it, there’s nothing. He doesn’t even know how he _knows_ there’s nothing. The only thing he’s certain about is that _he_ exists. The rest is just… there, yet not. He struggles to comprehend it.

It’s… comfortable? Despite Ichigo’s immense confusion, he doesn’t feel lost or afraid. Everything just _is_ \- no light or pain or pressure. Is the all encompassing blackness all that he can see, or is he blind? Is there a difference? Is he floating? He can’t feel anything. If he is, how? Why? Where is this? Just what is Ichigo experiencing?

_Dasats’q’isi._

[The beginning.]

A voice whispers, and it’d be deafening but somehow, Ichigo can tell it’s not _here_. The word comes from somewhere else, separate from this experience. 

The beginning of _what?_

This time, the voice doesn’t answer, but the world splits open.

Ichigo recoils, shrieking soundlessly as he feels what can only be pain. 

It’s too much! Too much light, too much feeling, too loud, too many smells and too many tastes. 

He’s a raw, exposed nerve- all the comfort of nothingness brutally stripped away at once. There’s nowhere to hide. He’s left to suffer, boiling alive. 

_Mt’k’ivneulia!_

[It hurts!]

Make it stop, Ichigo begs of anything listening, but no mercy is given. He’s going mad. He’s not meant for this! There _has_ to be a way to _make it stop!_ He needs- he **needs-!**

_Shignit…_

[Inside…]

Ichigo’s flung blindly into the cacophony of agony, everything screaming as it gets even **worse** but _inside is right there!_

Too cramped, too soft, too warm, too loud- still _too much,_ but better than before. He’s not outside anymore. 

He _understands_ now.

The light is fire, burning wood held aloft in rough hands. The feeling was the rock that broke, shattering his blissful rest. The senseless noise is voices, people frightened by what they unwittingly found, the crackle of fire and the clatter of dropped tools. The scents of smoke and the stench of sweat, wet rock and blood. Iron on his tongue too, the heavy, clinging moisture of air that’s been buried deep beneath the earth for too long. 

His shelter is sobbing, wiping frantically at their face, but their palms come away with only snot and tears. They reach feebly for the others, but they all scatter away in fear of being touched. 

_“Pēy.”_ Someone whispers, and it travels infectiously, until it’s all Ichigo can hear.

[Demon.]

“Illai,” His shelter begs, pleading as the faces of friends become strangers. “Tayavu ceytu vēṇṭām! Atu iṉṉum nāṉ tāṉ!”

[No], [please no! It’s still me!]

“Pēy.” The word is now judgment, and the fire presses forwards.

“ _Illai!”_ His shelter screams, and Ichigo suddenly understands that they’re about to be burned alive.

_Ara! Agharavitari t’k’ivili!_

[No! No more pain!]

He’s terrified and his shelter’s arms lash out, fingers hooked like claws. 

Bone cracks so easily, blood splatters the walls, screaming echoing in the caves.

Too much too much too much toomuchtoomuchtoomuchtoomuchtoomuch-

At last, _silence._

Well, almost. This body’s heart still pounds, blood rushing in their arteries, wind whistling in their airways. The shelter still whimpers, horrified and helpless.

Ichigo wishes things were back to the way they were, where he was comfortable and quiet and safe. Everything out here is just… too much, but he can’t go back. His home’s been ruined, cracked open and made useless. He already misses it fiercely.

 _Tayavu ceytu_ , the trembling voice that shares his head is still pleading. _Tayavu ceytu…_

[Please, please…]

Too much, Ichigo grimaces, and sinks deep within the body, where it’s quiet and dark. 

_Dzalian bevri. Met’I aghar._

[Too much. No more.]

* * *

“-igo! Ichigo! Wake up!”

Ichigo thrashes as he resurfaces, halfway to shouting before Renji slaps a hand over his mouth. He panics worse- he can’t breathe, he’s going to die- and there’s more hands on his face, forcing him to look straight.

“Ichigo, you’re okay! Look at me!” Rukia demands, her voice leaving no room for question. “Calm down, you’re okay. Trust me. Breathe.”

A sensation of eyes slinks away, and Ichigo begins to separate himself from the dream- no, the _memory_. 

Renji cautiously removes his hand, and Ichigo sucks in air harshly, still clutching at his friend’s arm but now for comfort instead of mindless fight. 

“Easy,” Renji murmurs as he helps Ichigo sit up, allowing himself to be leaned against now that Ichigo’s not fighting him anymore. “I got you. You’re alright.”

“Christ,” Ichigo croaks, and his fingers shake fiercely as he tries to rub his eyes, but he’s jittering too fast to manage.

Rukia takes his hand away before he accidentally scratches his own eye out. “Just take a minute, okay? Slow. With me, okay?”

Ichigo nods dumbly, trying to slow his panicked breathing to match Rukia’s coaxing. It helps that Renji’s breathing in time with her too, and pressed against Ichigo’s back, it’s even easier to follow.

“You good?” Renji asks, rubbing the side of Ichigo’s arm briskly.

“Y-yeah…” Ichigo breathes out a shaky sigh. “Fucking _shit._ ”

“What happened? Bad dream?” Rukia asks gently, sitting back on her heels and keeping a comforting hold on his hand.

“Yes- but no. Sort of?” Ichigo shakes his head, still feeling strung out and sick as he comes down from the shock and panic. “I think- it was a memory?”

Rukia narrows her brows, just a bit. “Of when Shiro…?”

“No- well, yes but not- not mine.” Ichigo hesitantly tries to explain, struggling to process everything he saw and _felt_. “It was theirs- Shiro’s, from the beginning. Where they came from.”

Rukia’s eyebrows fly nearly to her hairline. “Wh- really?”

“I _think_ so.” Ichigo insists. “It was the, the first time? Some people found them. They lived underground?”

“What? Who did?” 

“ _Shiro_ ,” Ichigo clarifies, realizing he’s not making a lot of sense. “Let me start over.”

Renji lets go easily when Ichigo sits up straight on his own, scooting over so that the three of them are sitting together in a close knit triangle. 

“Okay, so,” Ichigo starts over. “I was dreaming, or thought I was. There was nothing, but I existed. It was dark, silent, and I liked it. I think _I_ was Shiro.”

“Their memory.” Rukia realizes, and Renji nods along.

“Yeah, that was how they saw it.” Ichigo confirms. “But then, these people, they were- digging? I think they were digging. They broke open the rock where Shiro was- was- resting? Being? I don’t know. Just where they _were_ and it- and it _hurt._ ”

“What did, Ichigo?” 

“ _Everything,”_ Ichigo emphasizes, with the utmost seriousness. “Everything hurt. Too bright, too loud, too strong, too- just too much. It was maddening. I just wanted it to stop.”

Rukia squeezes his hand tightly as Ichigo’s breathing starts to quicken again. “Easy, Ichigo. That wasn’t you. It was Shiro.”

“Yeah, but I _felt_ everything.” Ichigo shakes his head. “It felt so real. It might as well have been me.”

“But it _wasn’t_.” Rukia insists. “No, Ichigo, look at me.”

He lifts his head and stares into her vehement violet gaze.

“It wasn’t you.” She repeats fiercely. “Whatever happened, that was Shiro. Alright?”

Ichigo inhales slowly, and tries to release his tension with the exhale. “Okay.”

“Okay?”

He nods. “Okay, yeah, you’re right. It wasn’t me.” Ichigo mumbles. “It wasn’t me.”

Renji reaches out and squeezes a broad hand over Ichigo’s forearm. 

“Ichigo… what else happened?” Rukia asks, now hesitant as Ichigo’s mumbling has unnerved her. “Did they- the people, the ones who found Shiro. Did they hurt them? Shiro?”

“No, I don’t-” Ichigo twitches, wanting to scrub his eyes but both his hands are caught and he doesn’t want to pull free from their comforting grips. “I don’t think so. Not on purpose. Not at first. It was everything else that hurt. Sight, smell, sound- _sense_. Before, there was nothing. Then there was _everything._ It was too much. I- _Shiro_ … they had to make it stop.”

There’s a moment of profound silence, a mutual moment of apprehension, a dreadful expectation of what happened next.

“They were desperate. I don’t think they ever meant to- they just wanted everything to be dark and quiet again.” Ichigo says quietly, voice low enough to be almost a whisper. “They needed to be inside again.”

Renji sucks in a startled breath of realization. “They took a host.”

Ichigo nods wearily. “The first one. Shiro, they- I remember they kept thinking of the person, their body as _shelter_. And then they- I don’t know, assimilated? I could- they understood what was happening all of a sudden.”

Ichigo doesn’t remember the first host’s pain or terror, but he remembers his own, and it’s enough. And then what’d happened afterwards? It’s enough to make his stomach roll in nausea all over again, but he swallows thickly and keeps it down.

It’s not him. It wasn’t Ichigo.

“Shiro learned Japanese.” Rukia is saying, keeping her voice low too, like anything too loud could shatter the moment irreparably. “They learn from their hosts.”

“Yeah, and they- the other people, I mean. They were afraid.” Ichigo continues, even as he dreads to say what comes next. “I didn’t- I don’t know their language, but Shiro understood it, so I could too. It was- they kept saying ‘Pēy’. It meant demon.”

“Not at first…” Renji mutters, his expression starting to darken. 

Ichigo nods grimly. “They tried to set Shiro’s host on fire.”

Rukia’s free hand flutters up to her chest. “My God…”

“And Shiro, they- they panicked. They didn’t want to be hurt anymore.” Ichigo squeezes his eyes shut, admitting the last bit he remembers as quickly as he can get it out. “They took over, and they killed everyone.”

The striking silence that follows is abruptly too similar, too close to what Ichigo remembers following after the violent slaughter of those ancient people. He rushes to fill it with noise.

“A-Afterwards, it was quiet again. Shiro calmed down. It was still too much. Their host kept begging, saying ‘please’ over and over again. Shiro retreated, went someplace quiet and dark. To rest.”

“Jesus Christ,” Renji mutters, scrubbing a palm over his forehead. “That’s fucked up. No wonder you were freaking out.”

“I don’t think they meant to,” Ichigo rushes, suddenly filled with the need to explain, to defend Shiro’s past actions. “I don’t remember feeling anything about _wanting_ to hurt those people. They just wanted everything to stop. Shiro didn’t want to be hurt again, they’re not-”

“Ichigo,” Rukia gently interrupts. “We’re not blaming Shiro. It was self defense.”

Ichigo’s swamped with relief that she understands, relaxing immediately as Renji bobs his head in weary agreement.

“Fucking- they were gonna burn ‘em alive? Yeah… nothing else they could’ve done.”

Shiro’s presence in his mind drifts a little forward, startling Ichigo with a jolt. He hadn’t realized that they were still hovering close enough to listen.

“Guys,” He squeezes Rukia’s hand tighter and twists his other one out of Renji’s grip so he can take it properly too. “Shiro’s listening. They can hear us.”

 **\I don’t… regret what I did./** Shiro says hesitantly, and Ichigo repeats the words aloud in a whisper. **\But I wish I’d understood sooner. I hadn’t known my own strength./**

“It’s not your fault.” Rukia assures once Ichigo’s done parroting the words. “You didn’t know any better.”

Shiro pushes a little further forwards, using Ichigo’s mouth to respond to her.

**“I know. It’s still a waste. It wasn’t their fault. They didn’t understand either.”**

Renji heaves a sigh. “Fair enough. All around fucking sucks, huh?”

 **“Diakh.”** Shiro agrees flatly.

[Yes.]

It must already be a word that they’ve learned because neither Rukia nor Renji ask for a translation. Oddly enough, their lack of reaction to the casual use of Naigroeg makes Ichigo feel suddenly soothed. 

They’re going to be alright.

“Well, it’s a bit earlier than we planned.” Rukia stands, brushing her legs off and squinting towards the horizon, where the sky is beginning to pale. “But since we’re all up already, might as well get a head start on the day.”

Ichigo appreciates what she’s doing. Having purpose in movement will keep them from collectively dwelling on the unexpectedly depressing start of the morning. Ichigo doesn’t blame Shiro for that either. Ichigo had wanted to know, and he’s starting to learn. It’s nobody’s fault how Shiro came to be.

They just are, and doing what they need to in order to survive. In this small, yet fundamental way, Shiro is like any human, especially in this new world. 

“We’ll hafta scavenge something to eat.” Renji adds, like a wet blanket over a balloon. “We ate the last of the cans yesterday.”

Ichigo means to suggest backtracking a bit to the creek they crossed yesterday, and experiences the nonsense Shiro had warned about before as they try to speak at the same time. What ends up coming out is a garbled, nightmarish sound that makes everyone jump.

“Christ,” Renji swears, dramatically holding a hand over his heart. “The fuck was that?”

Ichigo keeps quiet, allowing Shiro the opportunity first.

 **“Uazroba.”** They say. **“Ichigo suggests heading back to the water. I suggest a hunt.”**

[Nonsense.]

Rukia and Renji share a brief, dubious look.

“I don’t think any of us could really catch something without any tools.” Rukia cautiously explains.

Shiro pauses for only a moment. **“You misunderstood me. I meant that _I_ could hunt.”**

“Oh.” Rukia acknowledges, a bit sheepishly.

Renji sits forward more eagerly. “What could you catch?”

 **“Whatever’s around.”** Shiro says easily. **“Ichigo saw deer just yesterday. That should suffice, no?”**

Personally, Ichigo thought Shiro had been asleep for that moment. He wonders just how Shiro learns about these things, though he supposes there’s no restriction in his brain. It must be like looking through a window. All Shiro has to do is glance over.

“Fuck yeah it would.” Renji confirms excitedly, rubbing his hands together. “Gutting would be messy without the proper knives, but if we could spare a day to preserve some meat, we’d be set for the rest of the trip.”

“Is that safe?” Rukia debates. “We don’t exactly have sterility or refrigeration anymore. The last thing we need is to get sick, stranded all the way out here without any antibiotics.”

Renji scoffs. “You’ve got no faith in me, woman. Yeah, it’d be safe to eat if I smoke it right, and ‘long as Shiro doesn’t contaminate the carcass- err, no offense.”

**“None taken. Contamination won’t be a concern.”**

“See?” Renji holds his palm out flat. 

“Fine, fine.” Rukia concedes. “You’re the expert. It’s your call.”

“Ours, technically.” Renji corrects, looking between the pair of Rukia and Ichigo. “Whaddya think? Spend today smoking it out, travel tomorrow?”

“We’ll still need a clean environment.” Ichigo has to add, minutely relieved when Shiro doesn’t speak and his mouth doesn’t make _that sound_ again. “Plus someplace you could smoke it. It’d draw attention.”

He feels his lip curl back with derision, of its own volition- or rather, Shiro’s disdain.

**“Usargeblo won’t be a problem.”**

[The worthless]

“So Shiro’s got our backs,” Renji’s in the full swing now, standing so he can pace in spoken aloud thought. “I’d need a small, enclosed room. An old walk-in freezer would work. We could clean it pretty easy.”

Shiro suddenly lifts their hand, an oddly childlike gesture that nonetheless instantly captures everyone’s attention. They lower it once Rukia and Renji are both blinking at Shiro with attentive curiosity.

**“If it helps, I can also cook meat quickly. I may burn it though. It’s been a while since I had practice.”**

Their fire, Ichigo realizes, or energy or whatever it is. If anything could flash cook a bunch of meat to be safe for consumption, that would definitely do it. Ichigo very much doubts that any bacteria could survive that kind of heat- though, as Shiro warned, the meat might not last either. 

**\I’m not that bad./** Shiro reproaches sourly.

 _Sorry_ , Ichigo thinks.

“That’d definitely help, yeah.” Renji is quick to agree at least.

“In that case, why don’t we stick with something small?” Rukia suggests. “That way we can still eat and travel. Though, that _would_ require Shiro to hunt more… if you wouldn’t mind?”

 **“I don’t mind.”** Shiro assures. **“I’m used to humans eating frequently.”**

The assurance visibly trips Renji up a bit, the reminder that Shiro isn’t human, but he doesn’t let it slow him down.

“Would be safer. Ichigo?”

“I think we should stay on the move, if Shiro can keep catching us food along the way.” Ichigo agrees. 

**\You can rely on me more, you know./** Shiro murmurs, plucking the thought straight out of Ichigo’s subconscious before he even realizes it himself. **\I won’t let us starve./**

Shiro’s right, of course. Their offers aren’t selfless charity. They need the food as well. 

**\Well, no, but you do, and that’s close enough./**

“Wait, what?” Ichigo sputters aloud, thrown off track.

“What?”

“Just a sec,” Ichigo distractedly raises a finger in his friends’ direction, focusing inward. “What do you mean?”

 **\ _Your_ body needs its usual maragi,/** Shiro obligingly explains. **\And as I share it, technically, I need the same. But _my_ maragi is not the same./**

[sustenance]

Ichigo’s brows furrow in consternation at the supposed difference, then realization strikes like a lightning bolt as he remembers how he knew to make the gamble, to open the sarcophagus.

 _Ak t’q’uilia_ : here lies the cannibal.

Shiro goes quiet in the face of Ichigo’s realization, allowing him to process it on his own. It’s…. not great for his psyche, admittedly.

“Ichigo? You’ve gone pale. Are you okay?” Rukia worriedly checks in.

“Y-yeah.” Ichigo squeaks a bit, then clears his throat. “Just… realizing that Shiro- wait,” He sits up straight, stunned twice over. “Shiro, are you starving?”

 **\Diakh./** Shiro shockingly confirms, way too nonchalantly for the way they just admitted to _starving._

[Yes.]

“Wh- are they _starving?!”_ Renji incredulously repeats as Ichigo gawks at nothing.

“Yes!” He answers, suffused with disbelief. “Shiro! Why didn’t you say anything sooner?!”

 **\I didn’t think you could handle it./** Shiro states bluntly. **\You haven’t handled the transition well./**

Which, okay, _fair_ but Ichigo’s comfort doesn’t take priority over _literally starving!_

“Oh my God, Shiro no, okay? You need to eat.” Ichigo decides, everything else, even his own hunger, taking the backseat. “Do whatever you need to.”

 **\You won’t like it./** Shiro warns, and they have all the reason to be confident about this, considering how Ichigo has reacted to everything new he learns about his partner.

“No,” Ichigo admits honestly. “But it doesn’t matter what I won’t like. You _need_ to eat.”

“Ichigo, what the hell is going on?” Renji butts in, probably worried over only half of the argument that he can hear happening.

“Shiro’s a cannibal, remember?” Ichigo reminds his friends, as blunt as possible. “They haven’t been eating because I couldn’t handle it on top of everything else, but they’re starving and they need to eat!”

“Oh.” Renji’s eyes go as wide as an owl’s. “Shit.”

“Okay, okay, everybody calm down.” Rukia waves her hands in a patting motion, trying to be the voice of reason despite the way her own expression has gone a little queasy. “I-I agree. Nobody’s starving.”

Ichigo tries to aim a mental glare of ‘I told you so’ in Shiro’s general direction. The feeling, at least, seems to get across, because Shiro grumbles a few choice phrases about not being a child and how it’s not like anybody needs to watch them eat. Which- wait, what? Really?

 **\Yes, really./** Shiro echoes mockingly, a touch annoyed. **\I _just_ said you couldn’t handle it! Besides, why would I want to feel your nausea while I’m trying to eat?/**

It’s another fair point, and a part of Ichigo goes limp with relief. Despite his own insistence, he definitely wouldn’t have liked to experience… that.

“So… how would that work?” He questions, then explains for his friends’ benefit. “Shiro said I wouldn’t have to watch.”

Their expressions immediately loosen in sympathetic relief. 

**\I can wait until you’re asleep./** Shiro replies. **\The other option you won’t like./**

“Tell me anyways.” 

**\You’d be dakhures. No sensation./** Shiro offers. **\Most hosts panic about it./**

[shut away]

How many hosts Shiro has gone through to know that is a question for another day.

“Can we try it?” Ichigo asks, because he doesn’t really like the idea of Shiro waiting even longer to eat.

**\Tell your friends first./**

Oh, right.

“Shiro and I are going to try something.” Ichigo belatedly offers to his patiently waiting friends. “They’re gonna make it so I don’t feel or see anything that’s happening.”

“Oh, um, okay. Good luck?” Rukia offers, and Renji mutely gives a thumbs up.

“Okay, ready.” Ichigo says, wondering if he should shut his eyes.

Shiro sweeps him under.

Admittedly, Ichigo does initially panic. The sudden void from everything to nothing is shocking, but also intimately reminiscent of Shiro’s first memories. Ichigo’s fear comes from actually experiencing that for himself in true form, but also he dreads the pain that comes afterwards.

When it doesn’t come, Ichigo realizes that of course it isn’t. This isn’t that memory. There’s nothing out there that can hurt him like that. He isn’t Shiro. He’s still Ichigo. 

After that, Ichigo remembers the peace he’d felt, when it’d been just this in the memory. It’s not the same, since Ichigo still has his own mind, awareness and memories, but it’s similar enough to be soothing. Here, Ichigo doesn’t have to worry about anything. Here, he just exists, and there’s nothing wrong with any of it.

Time is meaningless in such a transdimensional space, and Ichigo blinks as light and sound pops the bubble he’d been contentedly drifting along inside.

 **\You’re a natural./** Shiro dryly applauds, but Ichigo thinks he can hear a touch of gratitude in their tone. 

“Hey, it worked!” Ichigo beams, pleased that the avenue is now a more than feasible option. 

“Oh hey, welcome back.” Renji greets, turning about from where he’d been watching at the cracked window.

Rukia absently repeats the greeting from where she’s slowly turning a rabbit over a crackling fire on a rudimentary spit. 

Ichigo blinks at the sight, then around at their surroundings.

“Wait, where are we?” 

How long had he been out?

“Few hours east of where we woke up.” Renji answers. “Shiro thought it’d be more efficient to just get everything done at once after they got you settled in. Got us some food, went off to hunt for themselves, came back just a bit ago with more food.”

“Oh.” Ichigo blinks again, noting that his muscles do feel warm with recent exercise. “Cool. That worked out really well then, huh?”

“Yup.” Renji pops his lips, crouching down next to Ichigo. “What’s it like?”

“Kinda like a nap, honestly.” Ichigo also stretches away the feeling as he says it. “But also a bit like Shiro’s memory- the very first bit, when there was nothing but it was good that way. It’s nice.”

“Can’t imagine.” Renji admits. “But I’m glad you’re cool with it. You hungry?”

“Yeah,” Ichigo starts automatically, since he technically doesn’t remember eating, but then pulls a double take. “Or not.”

Renji rocks on the balls of his feet unsteadily, reaching back to catch himself with a hand on the ground. “No?”

“No, I’m…”

 **\Don’t think too hard about it./** Shiro warns.

“I’m good.” Ichigo decides, heeding the warning. 

A full stomach is a good thing, no matter how it’s filled. 

Renji shrugs, hopefully missing the same realization. “Suit yourself. More for us.”

Ichigo nods, pulling both lips in between his teeth. “Mmhmm.”

 **\You’re thinking about it./** Shiro notes tiredly.

He can’t exactly help it, can he?

Shiro heaves a very exaggerated sigh. **\Do you want another memory? It’ll distract you, and I promise this one isn’t as bad. No one dies this time./**

Ichigo doesn’t know if Shiro intended for that to be a joke, morbid or otherwise, but he definitely appreciates the offer. He nods. _Yes, please_.

Shiro pulls him under again, but this time, a different world of color and sound welcomes him in, instead of the comforting nothingness.

* * *

“Meine Königin,” A very striking man with brightly dyed blue hair purrs, bowing playfully. “Möchtest du tanzen?”

[My queen,] [Would you like to dance?]

Ichigo can feel his face lift with an amused smirk, and he wordlessly takes the proffered hand. He’s not surprised when the man swiftly pins him in an embrace.

“Wie kühn,” He teases, despite not minding in the slightest. “Misshandlung Ihrer Königin?”

[How bold,] [Manhandling your queen?]

“Ich weiß.” His ‘dancing’ partner agrees with a secret smile. “Was würden die Leute sagen?”

[I know,] [What would the people say?]

“Erhängt ihn,” Ichigo answers confidently, still teasing. “Verbrenne auf dem Scheiterhaufen.”

[String him up,] [Burn at the stake.]

His partner gasps in mock fear, eyes glittering like amused sapphires. “Der Horror!”

[The horror!]

Ichigo breathes a laugh, no longer able to continue the play pretend, and the kiss his partner lays on his lips is filled with smug triumph at having earned the sound. 

“Weiß, Ich liebe dich.” His partner murmurs, much more seriously, with reverence. 

[White (whiteness, white man/woman), I love you.]

Ichigo hums, filled with fondness as he holds the man’s cheek in his palm and returns the gentle kiss. “Wie ich dich liebe.”

[As I love you.]

A light tap on canvas shatters the moment, and in an instant, Ichigo’s partner swaps doting for murderous. 

“Ja?” Ichigo calls, not nearly so irritated as he soothes his lover’s snarl with gentle nails on his lips. 

[Yes?]

“Der Feind rückt vor, meine Königin.” A woman’s voice answers, soft spoken through the canvas and furs. “Ihre Befehle?”

[The enemy advances, my queen.] [Your orders?]

Ichigo sighs regretfully, stepping out of his lover’s possessive embrace. 

“Bereiten Sie den Kriegstisch vor.” He calls, straightening out the lay of his cloak over his chest. “Ich werde bald da sein.”

[Prepare the war table.] [I’ll be there soon.]

“Ja, meine Königin.”

[Yes, my queen.]

“Warum spielst du diese Spiele mit ihnen?” His lover demands in an irate hiss, blue eyes flashing with fire. “Sie sind die wahren Wertlosen.”

[Why do you play these games with them?] [They’re the true worthless.]

“Ich kann nicht ohne sie leben.” Ichigo replies calmly, with an ease that says they’ve argued about this countless times over.

[I cannot live without them.]

His departure is delayed when his lover fiercely grabs a hand and draws him back.

“Dann bleib bei mir.” His lover insists, the demand a touch too sharp to be pleading. “Wir können zusammen sein.”

[Then stay with me.] [We can be together.]

Ichigo is already shaking his head before the words are finished. 

“Es ist kein Platz für mich.” He says, pressing a single finger over his lover’s heart as he looks up into the man’s burning expression. “Außerdem, wie würde ich dich dann berühren?”

[There’s no room for me.] [Besides, then how would I touch you?]

His lover’s intensity flickers only faintly, one hand shooting up to press Ichigo’s flat to his chest, as if wordlessly begging him still not to go.

Ichigo leans up on his toes, stopping just shy of another too soft kiss. “Wirst du einen Krieg für mich gewinnen?”

[Will you win a war for me?]

As he settles back down on the flat of his feet to await a response, his lover’s human visage begins to deteriorate. 

Baring the fangs of a panther, his lover fiercely swears. “Immer.”

[Always.]

* * *

Ichigo resurfaces from the memory slowly, the senses fading away as Shiro draws him up. He can tell that the memory continues onwards, bleeding like watercolors, and slip just as easily between his fingers. 

He’s plopped squarely back in possession of his own body, mind spinning, but aware once more that he is not Shiro, or that host of the past. He’s Ichigo, and he’s walking along with his friends under a cloudy sky as they traverse the long path back home.

Ichigo blinks and squints in the sunlight, the difference from indoors to outdoors only a placebo effect. His eyes are already adjusted. He wets his lips.

Who was that?

 **\The only one I won’t kill./** Shiro supplies, their voice syrupy with sleepiness. **\Chemi Grimmjow… Daghili var./**

[My Grimmjow… I’m tired.]

“Okay,” Ichigo whispers, drawing Rukia’s eyes back in mild surprise even with how quiet he is. “Sleep well.”

Shiro murmurs a vague response, then drifts away in numbness. Ichigo hopes they dream more of their lover.

As promised, the memory hadn’t been upsetting in the slightest. Rather, Shiro had shown him something that feels of equal importance. 

At one point, Shiro had a German speaking host and lover- who was also one of those creatures. Grimmjow, however, could apparently shapeshift between a humanlike appearance and a beastlike form. It’s… admittedly an alarming bit of news.

“Ichigo? You back with us?” Renji comes up from behind, clapping him on the shoulder.

Ichigo nods absently, still musing on all that he’s learned from the new memory. 

“Shiro said you were grossing yourself out and showed you something else. What’d you dream this time?”

“Shiro had a lover,” Ichigo says, looking up as Rukia slows her pace to pull even with them too. “His name was Grimmjow. They were speaking German, and they were in the middle of a war. Shiro was a queen.”

Renji blinks, momentarily flabbergasted. Obviously he hadn’t been expecting anything along those lines.

“That’s nice.” Rukia comments, her simple statement sincere. 

“Grimmjow wasn’t human either.” Ichigo feels compelled to add. “But he _looked_ human. He could change.”

Rukia’s eyes widen. “You mean he was a-”

“One of those creatures, yeah.” Ichigo finishes. “Some kind of big cat. I wish I could’ve seen more, but Shiro was tired and ended it there.”

“ _Shit,_ those things can disguise themselves?” Renji asks, appalled.

“Seems like it.” Ichigo mumbles, pulling out his bottom lip between forefinger and thumb as he considers the possibilities. “It felt like a long time ago… I dunno. We’ll hafta ask Shiro later. I’m worried about it too.”

“Shit.” Renji repeats, and the late afternoon sun makes his hair look like fire.

Ichigo’s missed most of the day, and it felt like hardly any time has passed. Will he even be able to sleep tonight? His body doesn’t feel tired at all.

“There’s no point in worrying about it now.” Rukia points out, thankfully before Ichigo can spiral into any paranoia theories. “What else did you see?”

“Um,” Ichigo tries to recall more. “Not much else than that. Mostly just Grimmjow and Shiro talking. They were real sweet on each other. S’cute.” 

Rukia smiles encouragingly.

“I’m pretty sure Shiro’s host was a woman that time,” Ichigo frowns thoughtfully at his short, stubby nails, so different from the ones in the memory. “They had these nice nails, and were shorter than Grimmjow by a bunch, and he called them his queen.”

“You said there was a war, too.” Rukia astutely remarks. “That’s strange. I didn’t know Germany had a queen in any wars.”

“It might not have been Germany.” Ichigo corrects her. “They were only speaking German, and were inside a tent. I heard a woman outside speak German too, but I never saw her.”

“Do you remember what she said?”

“Um, something about the enemy? She was asking Shiro for orders. She called them a queen too.”

“What did the tent look like?” Rukia continues.

“Wh- I don’t know. I wasn’t really looking, Grimmjow was kissing me.” Ichigo huffs in frustration, realizing too late what he just admitted. “Wait, not m-”

“Kissing you?!” Renji repeats with a hoot and a holler as Ichigo’s face reddens in embarrassment.

“Shut up, that’s not what I meant! I see it from Shiro’s perspective, okay? Grimmjow kissed _them_ , alright? Shut up, Renji, you ass!”

Unaffected by Ichigo’s shove, Renji skips a few steps to the side still chortling along. Ichigo huffs, giving the other man a swift boot to the ass, but besides a brief yelp, Renji’s amusement doesn’t really cease.

“Renji, quiet down before your braying gets us in trouble.” Rukia scolds smartly, and Renji does quiet a bit at that, but only a little. 

“Was that all?” She asks Ichigo, so curious about these experiences he goes through.

“Lemme think…” Ichigo mumbles, peeling a bit of dead skin off his lip as he does. “There was this one thing. Grimmjow got all pissed when that woman interrupted us- _them._ ”

“Ignore him.” Rukia smoothly intercedes Ichigo’s glare over her head at Renji’s salacious whistle.

“Anyway,” Ichigo grumbles. “He wanted Shiro to stay with him, but the way Shiro responded. They said, ‘there’s no room’. And then… ‘how would I touch you?’” He whispers that last bit, just for Rukia to hear, since she won’t rib him for it.

Rukia blinks. “Was Grimmjow offering to be Shiro’s host, maybe?”

Ichigo blinks back at her. “Oh, that makes sense. I think he might’ve been.” 

Rukia glances away in thought. “There’s no room… I wonder what they meant by that.”

“Oh wait,” Ichigo snaps his fingers. “I remember something else. Shiro said they needed them- us, humans. They need a host. But if Grimmjow’s not human, they can’t possess him? Or any of their own kind?” 

“It’s a possibility.” Rukia says candidly. “It’s so interesting that you can see bits of real history like that, Ichigo. I might be a little bit jealous. Imagine all we could learn…”

It is kind of exciting when she puts it like that. Who knows how much of history that Shiro personally witnessed? They strike Ichigo as spectacularly old, more so the first memory over the second. He hadn’t mentioned it before, since it hadn’t been all that important at the time compared to everything else, but those people who broke through the rock had been wearing furs and wielding stone tools. It’d definitely been a very, very long time ago. 

“Learning a bit more every day.” Ichigo says idly, glancing up at the sky.

Rukia hums a quiet, wordless agreement. 

Ichigo wonders if he should start a list. It could go something like:

  1. Shiro’s old as fuck and lived beneath the ground, senselessly and content, until an ancient people cracked upon their home and forced Shiro to take the first host. 
  2. Shiro had a German speaking lover named Grimmjow. They were in love. Shiro was a queen, and they can’t possess usargeblo. 



Ichigo blinks as he remembers something else, from what Shiro calls the creatures.

“Grimmjow called us- humans, I mean. He called humans the ‘true worthless’. Which means… he must’ve known Naigroeg too, right?”

“I suppose he must’ve.” Rukia agrees after a moment, following Ichigo’s thought process. “I can’t imagine Shiro exempted him if they insisted that we learn.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right.” Ichigo mentions. “He called Shiro something else too. Wei? Weiss? Fuck, I dunno. I don’t know German. I’m pretty sure it meant white too though. Or like, a white person. Something like that.”

“So White’s definitely Shiro’s name,” Renji finally adds something helpful to the conversation again. “It’s got the same meaning across all three languages.” 

“Four, in English too.” Ichigo reminds, but Renji’s still got a valid point. “That reminds me. Shiro’s name, written out in Naigroeg, it’s not just White. It’s _The_ White.”

“The White? The White of what?”

“That’s what I thought too!” Ichigo exclaims. “It’s gotta be a title, right?”

“It could be.” Rukia overrides Renji’s agreement, pointedly tampering down their ruminating. “Don’t assume anything too quickly.”

Ichigo sighs as, once again, Rukia’s right. “Yeah, yeah… If I ever remember to ask all these questions, I’m gonna learn a metric fuck ton.”

“I’m sure you’ll have time.” Rukia says, and she’s not even being sarcastic, but she’s also profoundly correct.

Shiro’s literally not going anywhere. They can’t. As long as Ichigo lives- another assumption- as long as Ichigo remains a viable host, rather, he has all the known time in the world to ask Shiro as many questions as he wants. 

Renji yawns broadly.

“We should look for a place to sleep tonight.” Rukia comments, finally changing the topic from Shiro.

“I can do first watch.” Ichigo volunteers. “I don’t feel tired at all.”

“Yeah, you weren’t here for most of the day.” Renji comments, not real mean or anything, just as a fact.

“Shiro taught us more Naigroeg,” Rukia freely supplies before Ichigo can ask if they’d talked about anything while he was off dreaming in nothingness. “You can go over it with me. I want to keep my memory sharp.”

“Sure.” Ichigo agrees with a smile, happy at the prospect. 

“I vote that barn.” Renji says, pointing ahead at a large building that’s maybe a thirty, forty minute walk still.

The roof’s intact, and they’ll be able to tell if anything’s coming for miles around. As long as it’s safe and clear inside, it has Ichigo’s vote as well.

“Barn it is.” Rukia decides, and collectively, they angle their feet towards it directly. 

* * *

“Ow!” Ichigo yelps, yanking his hand back automatically.

“You okay?” Renji calls, leaning further over from where he’s knelt to look over the reservoir edge.

“Yeah, just thorns or something.” Ichigo replies, cursing under his breath as he shakes the sting out. 

“Suck it up and keep climbing. You’re almost at the top.”

“Yeah, yeah. Asshole.” Ichigo mutters, nonetheless hooking an arm around the rope supporting his climb and sparing a moment to appraise his minor injury.

His thought process stalls out as the scratches sluggishly ooze black beads, rather than red. The stuff doesn’t smear either, instead it bubbles restlessly in place, as if impatient to climb back inside his body. As he watches, the thorns that were imbedded in his skin are pushed out, and the black substance grabs at his torn skin, hauling the tiny puncture marks shut over itself. 

“Ichigo? What’s wrong?” Rukia calls down too, no doubt concerned about why he stopped climbing.

Ichigo flexes his hand, his palm entirely unmarked from either wound or blood- black or red. It’s almost as if he imagined it.

Wordlessly, he reaches up and resumes the climb.

“Here,” Renji offers, reaching down with one hand. “Up you get.”

Ichigo grabs hold, feeling hyperaware of where his skin meets Renji’s palm, even though he saw for himself that there was nothing there anymore. He swings his knee up over the lip of the short cliff and hauls himself the rest of the way up with Renji’s help.

“Let me see,” Rukia prompts, already reaching for his hands before Ichigo can explain.

She turns them over, pinching her brows together when she doesn’t find anything.

“I don’t see anything.”

“Yeah, it closed up on its own.” Ichigo mumbles, and Rukia’s head jerks up.

“It did?”

Ichigo nods, pointing along where he’d been scratched by the thorns. There’s nothing different to feel, but he can’t easily forget how the blackness had writhed and squirmed its way back under his skin. It’s more unsettling than he’d ever want for something to be inside of him. Just when he’d started to get used to Shiro, something like this happens to make Ichigo’s stomach roil uncomfortably.

“Yeah, it was… kinda gross, if I’m being honest.” Ichigo admits. 

He supposes that he’d sort of assumed that whatever Shiro was, it’d stayed up inside of his head, or deep down where he’d never see it again. In hindsight, it was a foolish hope. Ichigo’s father is a doctor. He knows better anatomy than that. This little scratch and heal moment just proved that Shiro’s spread out throughout his entire body, in every tiny capillary. 

“Do you think Shiro-?”

“Oh yeah, no definitely.” Ichigo assures Rukia’s half formed question. “It definitely had to do with them. It was black.”

Rukia looks more curious than unsettled, probably because she hadn’t seen it happen. 

Shiro’s still asleep too, so it’s not like Ichigo can ask them if that’s normal. He thinks they’ve been sleeping for longer than normal, but what does Ichigo really know? It’s only been a few days, and their sleeping schedules have been pretty staggered anyways. 

“I’m not seeing a problem here.” Renji comments, coiling up the rope around one bent arm in preparation to put it away. “You healing up on your own means less wasted supplies.”

“No, yeah you’re right.” Ichigo agrees. “I just wasn’t expecting it, is all.”

Rukia lets go of his hand, and Ichigo stands up with her, adjusting his pack in the process. 

It’s barely worth carrying at this point, mostly empty save for a few field dressings and a canteen of water. They’re completely out of food, relying totally on anything they come across or what Shiro can catch. As noon approaches, the hunger’s setting in hard, especially after scaling the reservoir cliff. Ichigo may have to wake Shiro early if no edible plant life is found during scavenging. 

The sun’s scorching today too, not a cloud in sight. They’ve been walking in the shade whenever possible, but that entire climb had been totally in the sun. Ichigo would kill for some water, but it has to be rationed. They already drank at the foot of the cliff in preparation to sweat it out on the climb, and though they’re finally getting back into familiar territory, clean water isn’t something so easily found or made. 

Renji stuffs the rope in his own pack and yanks the drawstring shut. “Nearly there ya’ll.”

“I’m ready for a mattress again.” Rukia sighs longingly, taking point as the walk resumes.

“ _Shit_ ,” Ichigo realizes, like an absolute moron. “You guys, what’re we gonna tell everyone?”

“About?” Renji glances back, then his eyes widen as Ichigo frantically gestures to himself. “Oh, right. Shit.”

“It’ll be alright,” Rukia is quick to soothe, but can’t hind the anxious pinch between her brows either. “Shiro isn’t hostile. There won’t be a problem.”

“There’s no creatures inside the wall. What is Shiro gonna eat?” Ichigo worries, running a frantic hand through his sweat damp hair. 

“Never mind that, can _you_ even get through the wall anymore?” Renji counters.

Ichigo pales, remembering how he _just_ saw Shiro permeating every inch of his body. 

The wall is the only thing that protects what’s left of civilized humanity. It’s designed to keep anything else with a different biosignature out, and violently at that. Shiro definitely qualifies as inhuman, and Ichigo’s not separate from them.

“Stop scaring him!” Rukia hisses, slugging Renji in the arm.

“I’m not trying to!” Renji bites back, rubbing the new sore spot. “I’m trying to think of what we should do!”

“Fuck, how come we didn’t think about this earlier?” Ichigo groans. “There’s no _way_ old man Yamamoto is gonna let me in. He already hates me.”

“Oh stop,” Rukia slaps Ichigo’s wrist, and the sting is suitably distracting. “Nii-sama will help us.”

“He hates me more.” Ichigo says flatly, unflinching when Rukia slaps at him again with a huff. 

“We’re still two days from the wall. We’ll think of something.” She assures, cheeks still a little puffed up in offense for her brother. 

Ichigo grimly thinks that it doesn’t really matter what they come up with, if he can’t get through the wall at all. There’s absolutely a zero percent chance that even _if_ they can convince anyone that Shiro isn’t a threat, no one is going to sanction lowering the shield for any amount of time so Ichigo can pass through unharmed. Ichigo himself wouldn’t allow it, since that’d inevitably put thousands of people at risk. 

Christ, what is he going to do?

“One thing at a time,” Rukia is continuing. “Lunch is soon. Let’s start looking for anything edible, okay?”

Ichigo miserably heads for the tree line. 

He’d been really looking forward to seeing his sisters again after all this, and now he doesn’t know if he ever will again. Maybe that’s being dramatic, but he really doesn’t see any way to cross the wall without hurting Shiro, and inevitably himself. 

It’s not Shiro’s fault. All they’ve ever done is as Ichigo’s asked, being nothing but helpful whenever possible. Just yesterday, Ichigo saw that Shiro’s capable of love, just like anyone else, but not many people will be willing to look that far. All they’ll see is some kind of inhuman substance mixed in with Ichigo’s blood, and that’ll be enough to damn them both. 

Ichigo brushes some dead leaves aside with the toe of his shoe, crouching down as he reveals some enoki stalks. It’s a good find, even if there’s not many of them and they’re pretty short. They won’t taste like much on their own, and Ichigo misses the days he could order these wrapped in bacon at restaurants, but it’s a lot better than nothing. 

As he plucks the rest, Ichigo wishes he’d thought to bring back some evidence that Shiro kills their own kind. As hellish as it would’ve been to carry a chunk of stone all this way, it’d definitely lend weight to the idea of allowing Shiro inside the wall. People are much more likely to accept something if it benefits themselves, after all. Hindsight is a real bitch.

**\Ichigo./**

He startles, his hand whipping out simultaneously on its own volition. Ichigo’s slow to follow his body with his eyes, only realizing after he’s already holding it that he just caught a snake bare handed. If he’d been in control of that arm, he would’ve dropped it in shock and been bitten anyways.

Ichigo gawks, wide eyed and open mouthed, as his thumb firmly pushes forward into the snake’s esophagus. He’s too stunned to do anything but watch as his nail punctures the scales, and though the snake writhes madly for a few seconds longer, it then abruptly falls limp. 

Shiro yawns in the back of his head, and the snake’s body slides limply from Ichigo’s grip as Shiro relinquishes control over the limb, threat eliminated.

**\Is it time to eat?/**

His thumb is stained a thin, translucent brown- snake blood, Ichigo realizes dumbly. He felt that entire process, as short as it was. Belatedly, Ichigo also realizes that the now deceased snake is a mamushi. Once again, Shiro has saved his life.

“Hey, did you- Ichigo!”

Renji swoops in, yanking Ichigo back and dragging him as Ichigo’s brain still hasn’t quite caught up with his body.

“Christ, what’s wrong with you? _Please_ tell me you weren’t bit.”

“N-no, I’m fine.” Ichigo stutters, and the mushrooms are crushed to paste in his other hand. “I’m not bit.”

Renji exhales hard in relief, and drops Ichigo unceremoniously. “Why the fuck were you just sitting there then? It’s not the time to be staring down snakes.”

“It’s dead.” Ichigo states, nausea starting to creep in among the disbelief and shock. “Shiro caught it and killed it.”

“Oh. Then why- hey, what’s wrong?” Renji steps forward, and crouches at Ichigo’s height on the ground. “You look like you’re about to throw up.”

 **\Sorry./** Shiro offers contritely. **\I forgot./**

“No, it’s-” Ichigo has to swallow hard. “It’s okay. I’m fine. Just surprised me, is all.”

Renji cocks a brow, his tattooed forehead creasing in the motion. “Well, I know how to cook a snake, so good find.”

“Y-yeah.” Ichigo says dumbly, starting to pick himself back up. 

Rukia had started to run over at Renji’s yell, but she slowed as it became clear that no one was hurt, and only just reaches Ichigo as Renji picks up the mamushi with a quiet whistle at the size of it. 

“What happened?” She asks, dubiously eyeing the snake that Renji loops around one wrist. 

“I didn’t see the snake. Shiro killed it before it bit me.” Ichigo numbly reports, dismally appraising the mushrooms that probably aren’t salvageable. “I felt it. Freaked me out.”

“Oh.” Rukia notes, and comfortingly rubs his back. “What else did you find?”

“Some enoki,” Ichigo mumbles, appreciating that she doesn’t linger on the revelation. “Don’t know if we can still eat this though.”

“I found some too.” Rukia soothes, taking the bits that Ichigo hadn’t smashed to bits in a panicked fist. “This should be enough.”

“Plus this monster? We’re good.” Renji crows, oblivious to why Ichigo’s so unnerved.

 **\Sorry. I’ll be better./** Shiro offers again, and Ichigo shakes his head.

It’s not Shiro’s fault. Ichigo should be thanking them.

 **\You’re welcome, but Ichigo, you’re allowed to dislike bloodshed./** Shiro murmurs.

“It’s not the blood that bothers me.” Ichigo mumbles, shaking his head when Rukia shoots him a questioning look. “Talking to Shiro.”

“Oh. Good afternoon, Shiro.” Rukia greets warmly. “I hope you slept well.”

Shiro waits in case Ichigo means to respond in their place, but then speaks up when Ichigo remains silent.

**“Shuaghde mshvidobisa. I slept well, diakh. Gmadlobt.”**

“Means good afternoon. And thank you.” Ichigo translates before Rukia can ask, just in case she doesn’t already know. 

Rukia’s expression is a touch concerned, but she doesn’t press the issue. She guides Ichigo along with a gentle touch to his elbow, following Renji to where they can set up a brief camp for lunch break.

Ichigo sits gratefully, rubbing his hands clean on the underside of his pants. They’re already so stained that he can’t tell where the snake blood smears if he doesn’t look closely. It’s fine.

In an effort to distract himself and move on from the event, Ichigo brings up the issue about the wall.

 **\The what?/** Shiro briefly questions as they catch the thought, then the softest brush of fingers in Ichigo’s memory. **\Ah, that wall. Diakh, that could be a problem./**

[Yes.]

Ichigo’s got no clue what to do about it.

Shiro remains quiet, seemingly in their own thoughts as Ichigo can feel them digging for more memories. There’s not much there, at least concerning what Ichigo knows about the wall- or rather, the shield itself that the wall makes up only a part of. 

The entire thing is actually a sphere, expanding deep underground and just as high into the air over the city. The limit of Ichigo’s knowledge is some technological babble from years ago, when Urahara and Mayuri collaborated to put the thing up in the first place. All Ichigo really knows for certain is that it keeps the creatures out, and burns them upon contact.

He can almost feel Shiro wince.

 **\Perhaps…/** They begin hesitantly, rightfully dreading the encounter soon to come in only two days time. **\I _can_ withdraw from the surface level of your body, but it’ll be uncomfortable for you./**

Ichigo can imagine. Currently, Shiro’s spread out (at least Ichigo assumes) in a very thin layer within his blood and tissues. Withdrawing from his skin, in order to condense deeper into his most internal organs… just the sound of it isn’t remotely comforting. 

**\We could attempt it,/** Shiro offers. **\To see whether you could stand it first, before considering it an option./**

“Maybe later.” Ichigo mumbles, and notices that Rukia and Renji have stopped questioning it when he starts speaking without sensible reason. 

Shiro lets the acknowledgement pass without comment, sinking away to seemingly muse more about the problem in private, leaving Ichigo to watch lunch cook in relative peace and quiet.

It’s weird to think about, when Ichigo considers Shiro’s exclusivity to privacy. It doesn’t seem like _he_ has any secrets that Shiro doesn’t have access to, which is oddly one sided when they share a brain. Then again, Shiro _has_ mentioned that Ichigo _could_ know more about them. Does he just have to ask? The task of asking and receiving answers seems so slow and lengthy, especially in comparison to Shiro’s instantaneous assimilation. Ichigo barely acknowledges his own thoughts before Shiro’s addressing them. The scales are crazily tipped in one direction only.

Ichigo thinks he’s starting to understand Shiro’s earliest frustrations, on how Ichigo hadn’t known what he was getting into. There’s no way he could’ve, but he wishes he had anyways. He’d have answers already if he knew what he was doing. Searching for a source of the creatures, usargeblo, hadn’t prepared Ichigo in the slightest. 

[the worthless]

In reminder of his original goal, the whole point they’re out in the wastelands at all, Ichigo furrows his brows and thinks some more.

 _Could_ Shiro somehow be related to the source of the usargeblo? Shiro did have a tomb that was similar enough to all the rest, and they already knew about the beasts well beforehand. There was also the matter of Grimmjow to consider, and the man’s ability to change between two shapes. Shiro _cannibalized_ usargeblo. This fact inherently meant that they were the same species, and yet, Shiro’s nothing like the others that Ichigo or his friends have ever heard about.

Something isn’t adding up. 

_Shiro_ , Ichigo tries to think pointedly, aiming a mental prod at the portion of his brain that he’s long come to view as the section his partner occupies. _Tetri_.

Shiro pops back up. **\Hm?/**

“Do you know the source of the usargeblo?” Ichigo asks, unintentionally ignoring his friends as his question immediately draws their attention.

 **\Ts’q’aro?/** Shiro echoes, sounding confused. **\They’ve always been here./**

[The source?]

That’s unfortunately not the answer Ichigo’d been hoping for. He sighs despondently. If the usargeblo predate Shiro, then-

 **\I didn’t say that./** Shiro protests. **\Just that I don’t know where they originally came from either./**

Ichigo sits up straighter, curious about the distinction. “They came after you? You’re sure?”

 **\There were no memories of usargeblo in my first host, nor their oral history./** Shiro elaborates. **\I saw the first of their kind a few days after my gachena, when it attacked us. That was when I first learned I needed to eat more than just what my host did./**

[emergence]

“What did it look like? Have they changed since then?” Ichigo presses excitedly, thrilled on what very well could be the source of all their problems after all- at least, way back in the beginning of when usargeblo first appeared.

 **\Different./** Shiro confirms, being very verbose now that they’ve realized Ichigo’s hooked on their information. **\Significantly less formed than usargeblo today, and they weren’t white. The first I saw was red, and had crudely attempted to possess an animal as a host./**

Ichigo folds his legs under himself, leaning forward as if that’ll in any way help him get closer to Shiro’s explanations. 

**\Here, I’ll show you./** Shiro interrupts before Ichigo can launch into any further questions, sweeping him into a memory before Ichigo can reply as well.

* * *

His host is feeling desolate, wearily scavenging for fruits in the untamed wilderness, because going home is no longer a possibility. 

Ichigo ignores him, because this has been going on for days, and he’s still acclimatizing to being _out_ in the first place. He’s busy learning as well, scanning through countless memories that are overflowing with sensory information, assimilating what it all means and realizing that he has different names for everything, different from what his host calls the things.

Not _rāk_ , but _rok’i;_ and there’s countless other words that Ichigo knows as well as his own name, yet his host does not. No matter. Ichigo will teach him. His language makes more sense anyways, closer to how it should be.

[rock]

Suddenly, there’s _pain_ , and Ichigo panics, flying to the surface.

“Pēy!” His host is shrieking, trying in vain to fend off this _thing_ trying to savage his body. “Pēy, eṉakku utavuṅkaḷ!”

[Demon!] [Demon, help me!]

Unfamiliar fury boils in Ichigo as he roars to the forefront, seizing bodily control.

 **“Usargeblo!”** He hisses venomously, ripping his fingers into the writhing mass of squealing red as the word comes to him instantaneously. 

_Worthless_ thing! How _dare_ it attack _him!_

**“Me gamogvrches!”**

[I’ll eviscerate you!]

The baseless usargeblo has tried to consume a wild pig, and it’s messy. What is truly red and what is blood? The pig is screaming, eaten alive and carried as a half dead carcass, as usargeblo forces the beast to obey its own mindless, greedy hunger.

His host’s arms are ripped apart, but he does not bleed. _Ichigo_ is there, clinging to his skin, and as much as it hurts to be exposed once more to _everything_ , he is no longer defenseless.

The black crystallizes, becoming razors jutting from his host’s skin, jaggedly thin knives of obsidian that rip into usargeblo’s true red and tear it apart like a leaf under his host’s stubby nails.

Now usargeblo is shrieking as well, a cacophony of agonized wailing that makes Ichigo want to claw out his own ears to escape the _noise_. It’s trying to flee, realizing far too late that it’s helplessly outmatched, but there’s no escape, not even deep into the carcass of the pig.

Ichigo chases it down into the dirt, and _rips it apart._

His host is babbling frantic prayers, and Ichigo shoves the consciousness deeper, the distraction unwanted. He’ll handle that later. 

Now, as the pig has become paste and usargeblo shredded into hapless strings under his hands, Ichigo cranes his jaw open wide and descends. 

* * *

Just like the last memory, there’s too much to process when Ichigo comes out the other side.

Immediately, Shiro’s inherent knowledge, their language preceding even prior to a first host. How is that possible, when Ichigo personally experienced their lack of everything in the very beginning? 

Then, of course, the whole point of Shiro sharing the memory: that red usargeblo. 

Again, somehow, Shiro instantly knew what it was, as well as how to kill it. Fortunately, Shiro drew Ichigo up and safely away before they ate it, a fact that Ichigo’s very much grateful for, even under how quickly his mind is spinning to catch up.

_Holy shit, Renji was right!_

That red usargeblo had looked almost exactly as Ichigo remembers Shiro, straight from the sarcophagus. This strange, bizarrely behaving not-fluid substance that roiled and writhed and formed impossible shapes, and possessed a host! Only, this one had started _eating_ its host, from the inside out.

Ichigo swallows thickly, willing the nausea away forcefully.

“A-are they all like that?”

 **“Not any longer,”** Shiro answers quickly, aloud so Ichigo can realize that his friends have since become involved in the discussion while he’d been experiencing the memory. 

**“Usargeblo have evolved without hosts, but they’re _still_ usargeblo.” **His lip curls, marred with both disdain and disgust. **_“Uvargisia.”_**

[The worthless] [Unfit to exist.]

“But _you’re_ \- no, wait,” Ichigo halts, thinking furiously. “You _can’t_ be the same. Are you? You… You’re-“

 **“Me var Tetri.”** Shiro intones, placidly unoffended by Ichigo’s fumbling to comprehend what he’s just learned.

[I am The White.]

But what does that even _mean?_ ‘I am The White’? The White of what? Who? And _why_ white, and not black? 

**“I don’t understand.”** Shiro intrudes on Ichigo’s frantic musing, pulling his attention up and outward again. **“I showed you.”**

They did? What? When?

 **“Dasats’q’isi.”** Shiro reminds Ichigo, sounding bewildered. **“Don’t you remember?”**

[The beginning.]

The beginning? Wait, the first memory? Ichigo doesn’t remember _anything_ white about that experience, besides maybe the flickers of fire or the dust of stone. What is Shiro talking about?

 **“You didn’t see-?”** Shiro cuts themself off with a huff, suddenly irritated. **“Rat’om ar _itsit_?” **

[Why don’t you _know?_ ]

“ _I don’t know!”_ Ichigo cries, equally frustrated. “I wish I did, but I don’t! I’m _trying_ , okay?! I don’t-!”

“Ichigo, hey,” Renji abruptly crowds into his vision, his brows pulled tight together in stress. “Quiet down a little, huh? The fire’s risk enough, don’t be screaming.”

Ichigo snaps his mouth shut so hard his teeth click together, and he exhales hard out through his nose. 

He’d forgotten where he was, that it’s not safe to be debating on this topic for too long. He’s still outside the wall, with an entity that he doesn’t understand burrowed into every essence of his body, and there’s still two days worth of travel until they find out whether he can even pass through the wall at all.

“I know you’re frustrated, God knows I can hear it,” Renji continues, squeezing Ichigo’s shoulders soothingly. “We’re all a little strung out and short on answers here. Slow down, okay? Relax. We’ll get there.”

Ichigo fiercely scrubs both calloused palms over his face, trying hard to take Renji’s words to heart.

 **\Bodishi./** Shiro offers a private, contrite apology. **\Sheni brali araa./**

[Sorry. It’s not your fault.]

Then whose is it?

This time, Shiro has no answer.

“Here, Ichigo.” Rukia quietly but firmly says, pushing a few tiny skewers of meat and mushroom into his hands next. “Take a step back for a few minutes. Eat, and then maybe we can talk it out better between all four of us. Later, alright?”

Ichigo nods numbly, putting the lukewarm and greasy food to his teeth and chewing mechanically. 

Both his friends are right. This entire trip has stretched him thin. As greatly as he wants to learn as much as he can, facts are that Ichigo’s just not of the mental strength to handle much more of anything. He needs to handle things slow, one at a time, so he doesn’t blow his lid again and get them all in trouble. 

Shiro makes this bizarre aborted half noise, more like a mental version of his tongue tripping over itself, as they seemingly start to say something but then decide otherwise. 

Ichigo’s of half a mind to invite them to say it anyways, but simultaneously grateful that Shiro leaves it abandoned. God, he’s so tired.

Shiro retreats a little more, and Ichigo feels immediately guilty.

 **\Sheni brali araa./** They repeat softly, their voice sounding farther away but still so clear and present. **\I’ve been impatient too./**

[It’s not your fault.]

Ichigo eats, listening to his friends’ idle conversation about which direction will be best to take next, and just wishes he understood Shiro as easily as they knew him.

He can sense Shiro hesitate again, before they murmur something Ichigo doesn’t quite catch, and then they fade into the background entirely. Ichigo hopes Shiro’s gathering a better idea of what to say next, because now everyone knows that _he_ doesn’t have a damn clue on what to do next, beyond just getting home.

It couldn’t have been as easy as finding an old book, could it?

* * *

"Iunno," Renji shrugs, lacing his fingers together on top of his head as he walks. "I still think time has something to do with it. Evolution and shit."

"Okay, but even if that's the case," Ichigo allows before providing a counterpoint to the most recent theory. "I don't think Shiro's ever had any formal understanding on how the human brain works, or how it changes. They assimilate with a foreign body instinctually. If they didn't, I'd be dead."

"So they know enough to keep you unharmed, but not enough to know why?" Rukia guesses, a bit dubious because it admittedly does sound a little hard to believe.

"I guess?" Ichigo hazards, honestly having no idea.

Rukia suddenly gasps, giving Ichigo a near heart attack as he assumes the worst until she speaks up naturally.

"Wait, I have an idea!"

"Jesus," Ichigo breathes with a hand over his heart, which Renji mimics with a mumbled swear about Rukia's dramatics.

Rukia plows onward, undeterred. "Ichigo, do you remember telling me when you hit your head? When you were nine?"

Ichigo's brows fly nearly to his hairline, catching on almost immediately to what she's getting at.

"Yeah, I fell into the canal and nearly busted my head open. I was in a medically induced coma for like a week. You think that has something to do with it?"

"It's possible." Rukia nods, looking rightfully pleased with the most sound theory so far. "We could ask if Shiro's ever had a host who's had brain trauma before."

Ichigo's hand lifts automatically to the back right side of his head, not quite touching the old scars hidden by his hair.

"The doctors said everything was fine, but maybe you're right. There's bound to be scar tissue. Maybe there's something that keeps me from doing… whatever it is Shiro keeps expecting from me."

"And if Shiro doesn't actually know how your brain works, they just leave it alone, thinking it's normal." Renji nods along, perking up. "Hey, you think they could fix it? Like with my leg and your hand?"

"You _just_ said they don't know how his brain works." Rukia retorts. "How are they supposed to fix something if they don't even know what's wrong?"

"I mean, we could always ask?" Ichigo offers. "Like, yeah maybe Shiro learned how to heal wounds because _I_ know how to treat minor injuries, but there's really no telling the scope of their abilities. Maybe they _do_ know how to fix brain injuries."

"That sarcophagus really didn't strike me as from a time when people knew how to do brain surgery though." Rukia points out, rather reasonably if blunt.

Ichigo heaves another sigh. "Yeah, you're probably right. Ugh, can we stop talking about this? We're getting nowhere and it's only frustrating me again."

They're probably better off leaving theories about just how Shiro coexists within his body alone. None of them have enough medical knowledge to even know how the human body is supposed to work regularly, much less with a foreign entity sharing space in every tissue.

Ichigo's dad might have a better idea, or Urahara- if Ichigo can ever see them inside the wall again- but neither of them are brain surgeons either, and the world as it is today is sorely lacking in the amount of knowledge that had been accumulated before the fall of all human society. They may never figure out how Shiro coexists with Ichigo, much less why or what Ichigo is lacking when it comes to them.

His friends unanimously and wordlessly agree to let the matter rest for now, at least until Shiro's there to provide more answers.

That doesn't seem like it'll be the case for a while though, considering Shiro fell asleep an hour ago, before they'd even gotten up and going again from lunch. Ichigo still doesn't know their energy levels, or how often Shiro needs to eat, or truly anything of real importance. He doesn't know what's normal or what isn't. He's totally reliant upon Shiro making their needs known, and so far, they've been very sparse on providing those details.

There's just too much that Ichigo doesn't know, and seemingly not enough time in the day to learn. It feels like every time Shiro gives him a piece of an explanation, Ichigo is left with even more questions and no way to answer them.

Has it really only been five days? God, it feels like it's been so much longer.

"Say, how old do you think that sarcophagus was anyway?"

"Renji," Rukia hisses. "Ichigo just said-"

"No, it's fine." Ichigo allows. "I don't mind talking about Shiro still. It's just their relation to me that's frustrating."

"You're mister archeology major," Renji's happy to continue now that he's got the green light. "What's your best guess?"

"Without any carbon dating? Taking into account everything unnatural about those tombs in the first place?" Ichigo shrugs. "I don't have the faintest fucking clue, 'cept that everything in Shiro's was written in Naigroeg, which roughly fell out of use around… 1200 BC?"

Renji whistles. "Shit, you think they're that old?"

"It can't be, could it?" Rukia furrows her brows, visibly struggling just to picture the correct time period. "Shiro needs to eat. How would they not have starved in all that time?"

"Who knows?" Ichigo shrugs, too tired to theorize more on what Shiro can or can't do. "It would be a hell of a coincidence though. I mean, one of the first things Shiro did when they met you guys was insist you learn Naigroeg, so I find it hard to imagine they'd just let their language die out if they were up and about."

Renji whistles again. "Damn, that's a good point. No way that would've flown."

"But…" Rukia's still struggling. "That's thousands of years."

"Maybe the tombs are like a time capsule or something." Renji offers, only joking because Rukia looks like she's having a crisis over this non explanation.

Ichigo stops dead in his tracks.

"Oh my God, you guys, that's it." He realizes, emphasizing himself when they turn to look at him. "Time! It _froze!_ "

"That's not poss-" Rukia's rejection chokes and dies, her eyes blowing wide as she too suddenly remembers the very start of all this.

Ichigo could facepalm he feels so stupid.

"It makes so much sense! Why they didn't starve, why they expected me to know them! What if it hasn't been thousands of years or- or however long. What if it's been only _days_ for them?"

"Wait, wait what? The hell are you talking about? Time _froze?_ " Renji echoes, confused. "When?"

"When I opened the sarcophagus!" Ichigo reminds him.

Renji's eyes go wide too. "Oh shit, that's right. I totally forgot."

"We all did." Rukia murmurs. "That would explain so much. I wonder why Shiro hasn't mentioned anything if that's the case. They know Ichigo's memories, so surely they must know how long it's been, right?"

“I mean, is there really that big a difference?” Ichigo spans his arms around, indicating all the barren landscape and destroyed buildings that may as well be ruins. 

“Not _now_ , I meant before.” Rukia retorts a bit crossly. “Surely Shiro’s seen the cities in your memories, all the technology we had. You lived in a clinic, Ichigo. If Shiro really is from 1200 BC, then they shouldn’t understand any of that.” 

“I don’t know.” Ichigo blows out air explosively. “It’s all just more questions, one after the other. We’re never gonna figure out anything at this rate.”

“Once we’re back home- and we _all will be_ ,” Rukia emphasizes pointedly. “We’ll have more time to figure it out.”

“Yeah, and then Mayuri will strap me to a dissection table.” Ichigo mutters darkly.

Renji scoffs. “Please. No way is Shiro gonna let that happen. You’ll be fine.”

It’s a solid counterpoint. Shiro _definitely_ wouldn’t stand for that. Shiro defending themself, however rightfully, will only make them seem more violent and intrusive. Plus, Mayuri helped make the wall. What if he has technology to restrain Shiro anyway?

Ichigo doesn’t want to think about it. If there’s any way to sneak by the wall, he would truly only trust his family and Urahara with the knowledge about Shiro. Honestly, the fewer people who know, the easier everything will be. Ichigo does _not_ want to be the center of old man Yamamoto’s next exclusionist campaign. 

For now, they resume walking yet again. Just two more days, and then a whole new literal wall of problems will meet them. Ichigo wholly dreads it.

* * *

Consciousness is a hazy, uncertain thing due to the senselessness of the sheer absence of everything. Is he awake? Is this dreaming, or another memory? Is he Ichigo still, or another version of Shiro? The answer eludes him, whoever he is, as the nothingness persists and continues to impede true comprehension. 

It’s impossible to tell how long he waits, drifting in some indeterminable space between wakefulness and something else, confused on his identity. The feeling is different from before, separate from the first memory and not nearly as cohesive as when Shiro shut him away. Is he only in the latter, but confused because he was already in such a state before waking? If so, why? Is Shiro eating again?

The frustration helps Ichigo feel marginally more confident that he is himself, and not experiencing another memory. A warning would’ve been nice. Everything would be easier if Shiro would just willingly communicate more. All assumptions about what Ichigo should or may not know aside, it doesn’t take much effort to just _talk_. 

Shiro has to be conscious right now, shouldn’t they? In order to shut Ichigo away, they have to be aware, right? What are the rules here? Can they hear Ichigo even now? There’s just no way to tell. Has he been kept like this for long? How much longer will he be suspended in purgatory? 

_Tetri? Are you there?_

Ichigo waits, but there’s nothing: no answer, no sound, no change at all. 

Is there _anything_ he can do? There has to be a reason Shiro’s shutting him away for so long, right? Are they being attacked? Are Rukia and Renji alright? It’s their deal that Shiro will keep them safe, and they’ve showed no signs of being hostile yet, so why? Can they really not hear Ichigo, or are they ignoring him purposefully? 

_Gtkhovt, Tetri. Mip’asukhe._

[Please, The White. Answer me.]

Nothing.

Maybe it hasn’t been that long, and Ichigo’s just panicking because humans aren’t meant to live in such senseless solitary, especially not those accustomed to company. There’s no proof that anything’s even wrong. After all, Shiro didn’t talk to him before when Ichigo was like this, and that time had lasted hours but only felt like minutes.

Perhaps Shiro had been restless, and wanted to walk under their own power rather than be continuously kept inside Ichigo’s mind. They can’t really be blamed if that’s the case, because Ichigo’s sympathetic. He wouldn’t want to be forever trapped as a passenger either. Ichigo made a deal to share his body. He has to honor it. 

_Tetri?_

Quite frankly, Ichigo has no other options, but to wait.

**Author's Note:**

> -Ichigo & co use gender-neutral pronouns for Shiro bc in this, they're an inhuman entity who's possessed multiple hosts of either gender (& for the record, Grimm doesn't care whatever body Shiro's in either) so assigning either/or pronouns doesn't rly work. Plus I wanted to try my hand at a genderfluid character.  
> -Is Shiro ooc? Yeah probably, but my motivation for it was they're ancient af & somewhat all-knowing, so it's more like a combination of Hollow-Shiro and Quincy-Zangetsu, aka Tensa Zangetsu when they combined their powers. Still plenty wild & violent in some cases, but also knowledgeable and calm. Hope it doesn't throw anybody off irreversibly. (It's permanently Shiro in my head, as much as it's always thrilled me to the bone that Shiro IS Zangetsu, & has been all along.)  
> -Translations of foreign languages used are included where spoken, bc this work is too long to make ppl scroll all the way to the bottom for notes when it's used so often. Sorry if that makes it seem pointless or breaks immersion or whatever, or if the formatting makes it more (or less?? tell me) annoying to read. It's just easier for me too. The languages used are (google translate) Georgian (or Naigroeg) Tamil, and German (so far). (Creative, I know, shush.) Any corrections are welcome. 
> 
> Thoughts??? pls, i'm starving for em.  
> Any obvious typos, format issues? Super awful inconsistencies or plot holes? Smth rly squick you out that I should've tagged for? Lay it on me.  
> Ideas/hopes for what's next? Mention it & at this point, it may happen!! Tags will update with next chapter (crosses fingers).  
> Thx for anybody who read & got this far, kudos and/or commented! You're the real good food here.
> 
>  **Edit(s):**  
>  Thanks to Temare for some German corrections! <3  
> Thanks to FantasticWhovian for some word/phrase corrections!


End file.
